Author: Dissent

Paul McDougall reports in InformationWeek: In the wake of a widely publicized security breach that left thousands of patient records exposed, the federal government’s National Institute of Health is forbidding all employees who use Apple’s MacBook laptops from handling sensitive data as of Friday, InformationWeek has learned. Employees at the health agency who store medical…

The BBC reports: A confidential document containing the sickness records of staff at Plymouth City Council has been found on a street outside a pub. A passer-by handed the paperwork to a local newspaper. It contained general staff sickness data from six months ago and included the names of 15 staff with personnel numbers and…

Theodore F. di Stefano writes in E-Commerce Times: Consolidated medical information online could not only save lives but also create efficiencies. Plus, privacy concerns could be swept aside by allowing patients to secure their data by giving short-term or long-term passwords to medical providers. […] First of all, you the patient would obviously have the…

Over in her blog, Well, on the New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope recently blogged about the recent disclosure that an employee at UCLA had peeked at Farrah Fawcett’s records. In response to her blog, one commenter, “SavvyDoc,” commented that it was a “HUGE” invasion of privacy and the employee should have reprimanded (just “reprimanded,” SavvyDoc?),…

The Associated Press reports: If there’s one person whose medical records you wouldn’t want to lose track of, it’s the co-chairman of the congressional caucus that focuses on protecting consumers’ privacy. But that’s whose medical records went missing. Rep. Joe Barton was one of 3,000 patients whose records may have been breached when a National…

On NPR today: As more doctors go online to communicate with patients, two of the country’s biggest health insurers have started reimbursing patients for the Internet visits. But critics say the online advising could lead to errors, and patient privacy could be compromised. Listen to the interview on NPR. iHealthBeat describes the segment: Earlier this…