Microsoft Health Vault-Raising Questions
Microsoft launched its Consumer health service called Health Vault-to signify Security on October 04 2007.Following the launch and also massive marketing,blogosphere and media were filled and continue with analysis and comments on Personal Health Record.Up until then,there were only a couple of articles in the blogosphere dedicated to Personal Health Record topic.Now not only there are plethora of articles but also polls which show that people are really interested in Personal Health Record products.
Have we reached the tipping point?
This is a very difficult question to analyze,as still many consumers are not aware of the term Personal Health Record.There is no consensus definition about the term.There are well more than 200 vendors in the marketplace trying to sell Personal health record products.
Various organizations have now started working on developing a working definition for Personal health record.Even the HL-7 organization which focused on Electronic Health Record is moving on working definition of Personal health record.But,when will all these definitions see the light of day?Again a difficult question to answer.
Will personal health records really benefit physicians and also hospitals.Again that is a very difficult question.If personal health records are really personal,then they need to be populated by Individuals,questions arise about their authenticity.If there is a extensive personal health data,then the physician will have to wade through all these data before coming onto a working diagnosis of any patient,this adds to confusion and also could create avenues for potential litigations in future.So,will physicians adopt PHRs widely?
What if patients like to store their Personal health records in their own format?May be a USB key or just a plain paper based format?Will Physicians and hospitals accept them?
What if the patients donot have their health records on Microsoft Health Vault but would prefer Google Health-(due to arrive in early 2008)?
These Questions will definitely need to be answered before we embark on the road to get Personal health records for all.
Filed under: Microsoft Health Vault, Personal Health Records | Tagged: Personal Health Record, PHR, Microsoft Health Vault, Benefits, Physicians, HL7
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