[Med-privacy] " Justice Department action sparks EMR debate"

[pmarshall]

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Daily News - April 5, 2004 - Monday

Justice Department action sparks EMR debate
Source: Healthcare IT News / Author: Bernie Monegain, News/online editor



When the Justice Department sought recently to seize patients=19 private =

medical records from six hospitals and six Planned Parenthood affiliates =

to collect information about late-term abortions, it sparked a debate=20
about privacy and the electronic medical record.

The Justice Department dropped its efforts to obtain the records at a=20
Chicago hospital after court rulings that releasing the records would=20
invade patients=19 privacy. But how that will affect the government=19s=20
quest with other hospitals is not yet know, and the debate over privacy=20
goes on.

The records sought were paper. But what if they had been electronic?=20
Would it have made it easier for the government to pry?

Paper or electronic, requests like those of the Justice Department=20
=1Cerodes public trust,=1D says Dan Rode, vice president of policy and=20
government relations for the American Health and Information Management=20
Association. The Justice Department argued that a privacy violation=20
would not take place as long as the names and personal information of=20
the women on the medical records were blacked out.

=1CIf we had an EMR, it would be easier to remove patient-specific=20
information,=1D Rode said. =1CIt would be easier to protect the record. I=
t=19s=20
a positive in a negative situation.=1D

Geff Brown, an IT lawyer in the Chicago office of the international law=20
firm of Mayer, Brown, Rowe and Maw agrees. =1CEMRs will make it easier to=
=20
protect patient medical information from inappropriate access while=20
making legitimate access easier, he said.

=1CIf your choice is to have your medical record stored in a secure=20
environment in a computer as opposed to lying around as paper on a desk, =

I would choose the secure environment,=1D he said.

The justice department request and others like it will not thwart the=20
healthcare industry=19s efforts to convert to electronic records, Brown=20
said. There may be concerns, he said, but the drive should be to enforce =

the law.

Rode is in favor of enforcing the law, but the idea that there are=20
blanket requests for records puts a chill on EMR plans, he contends,=20
even when electronic records offer better safeguards. =1CWe need to get=20
the public=19s trust,=1D he said.

A federal appeals court on March 26 quashed the Justice Department=19s=20
request to obtain the medical records from Northwestern Memorial=20
Hospital in Chicago.

The 2-1 ruling found that if Northwestern Memorial turned over the=20
records it would invade patient privacy, upholding a ruling made by=20
Chicago=19s chief U.S. district judge in February.

The Justice Department also has called for the abortion records of=20
dozens of other hospitals, but Northwestern Memorial is the only one to=20
claim victory in court. On March 5, San Francisco successfully fought to =

stop the Justice Department from seizing the medical records of 2,700=20
patients who had received abortions at San Francisco public health=20
facilities throughout the past three years.

In a March 14 column in the Alameda (California) Times-Star, Kate=20
Scannell, a physician and medical writer observed: =1CInterestingly, the =

Justice Department=19s recent threats to medical privacy have occurred=20
during the same time that our federal government has been emphasizing=20
the importance of medical record privacy in promoting national=20
implementation and compliance with its landmark HIPAA laws.


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