Week 8
- Dave Aronberg wants to ensure the safety of emergency medical workers who's fear is to be threatened after responding to a call. His bill that calls to make the home addresses of EMTs and paramedics threatens to erode a key right of Floridians. Aronberg defends this proposed exemption because it was brought fourth because of gang violence in Florida. EMTs worry about being assulted by gang members if they treated a rival gang victim. Police officers' home addresses are exempt from the public records and because EMT's respond among the first people their addresses should also be exempt, sates Aronberg. With this bill lawmakers are forced to balance privacy rights against the public's right to know. Crist has reinforced the sunshine theme and established the Office of Open Government to promote access to state records. The exemptions that are seeked this year range from digital security-camera recordings that are provided to law-enforcement agencies, to any part of a record that an agency has that contains personal identifications.
This article relates to our class because we have been talking and reading various cases dealing with privacy laws. The last part about specific exemptions that are looked for, the security-camera one, relates to a video surveillance example given in class.
- Questions whether doctors should have access to pervious unrelated things in our history are being brought up. This is the case because patients' medical records are being moved from an analog source, a manila folder, to a digital source such as the Internet. This allows easier access to medical history that some patients might not want out there. Dr. March Overhage is a member of the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics which encouraged HHS to allow patients the ability to hide some information from their online medical records. Overhage believes that its a patient's right to protect this information but he also realizes that in order for physicians to provide the best possible care must know this information.
He believes that patients should pick doctors they trust to best protect their privacy. The committee's letter is part of the federal government's process in establishing guidelines. The development of large health-data networks can lead to the complication of big detailed medical histories. Deborah Peel believes that the strongest privacy rights Americans have are health privacy rights. The letter that was drafted by the committee notes that computerized health records hold the potential for improving effectiveness of health care. But they also noted that any doctor or health-care worker could have access to a person's complete medical history.
Another concern about highly detailed electronic patient histories is the possibility of employers or insurance companies denying them because of their now known medical histories. Overhage's concern is about patients having the power to exclude certain details that doctors might need to access to make important decisions about their care. Overage believes that society must find a way to balance the benefits of giving doctors more access to people's information with protection of patients' privacy.
This relates to our class discussion on privacy rights. Having one's medical history out there seems like it would bring the possibility of a lot of lawsuits. Information could be taken out of context and possibly be placed on online forums and there is a chance for a lawsuit. Like many of the lawsuits mentioned in the readings of Chapter 6 by Lamoureux.
- The CDT or the Center for Democracy and Technology has taken over the Health Privacy Project (HPP). The merged organization will work on several patient privacy issues that are remaining. An increase in adoption of health IT has taken place in recent years but there has been little progress in resolving the privacy issues. ONe of the major issues in health privacy is patient consent. McGraw believe that the bill might be doing to much way too soon leading to problems in getting approved. The Patient Privacy Rights group has endorsed the bill. They believe that the bill puts patients in control of their health information.
Our class discussions lately have revolved around the question of privacy laws. A persons medical history is very sensitive as there is information that is very personal found on that chart. If someone were to get a hold of that information they could publicize the information and it could be considered highly offensive. This can lead to some lawsuits. However, if the information is true, in some states, they cannot win a defamation case as discussed in class.