Comments on: News 5/14/08

By: Matthew Holt

Matthew Holt — Sun, 18 May 2008 20:41:51 +0000

I’ve become progressively more pissed off with Deborah Peel and this last one is just stupid. How many times are we going to have to hear this? “Sorry that this medication prescribed killed your mother, I didn’t know about the 6 other drugs she was on because even though it could have been in my eRx application, the PBM hadn’t got her informed consent to tell me”

I did a little investigation of her group over on THCB, and they seem to be a bunch of anti-government nuts of the “I love my country but fear my government” type. For more read this on THCB http://tinyurl.com/6bltsy

By: Lazlo Hollyfeld

Lazlo Hollyfeld — Wed, 14 May 2008 19:00:57 +0000

I don’t want to underscore privacy and security concerns. It is a very real and legit for several reasons. The issue though is when is the ideal getting in the way of the good.

Not to mention that fact that I have heard mixed things about Peel and others who have hopped on board this trend. Not necessarily the altruistic do-gooders that some in the press and other corners make them out to go be. I wish someone would do a little more digging here to see if there is any dirt and to knock down any rumors that the Patient Privacy Rights group might create some kind of “privacy certification” for vendors (for a nominal fee of course).

By: Michael

Michael — Wed, 14 May 2008 13:13:09 +0000

re: razor blades. Get them on eBay- nothing like year’s supply for the price of 3 8packs!

re: Deborah Peel. I echo Lazlo’s sentiment! Reuse of data is a fact of life. By her logic EMR data should only be used for clinical care, not research? Where is the downside? Dont our google searches tell more about us than our (de-identified) prescription histories already?

By: Winston Zeddemore

Winston Zeddemore — Wed, 14 May 2008 11:39:39 +0000

Re: Hersher. Spoke with a recruiter at HIMSS who had been with Hersher previously, was already with a new firm, and told me back then that Hersher was breaking up.

By: Lazlo Hollyfeld

Lazlo Hollyfeld — Wed, 14 May 2008 02:56:21 +0000

I am getting really tired of Deborah Peel and the privacy zealots “crying wolf” about every thing remotely related to the sharing of health care data. Besides mucking up one issue (eprescribing) that is actually starting to get real traction in the Health IT space, there are a number of good things that come out of this including employers and health plans trying to drive the prescribing rates of generics (one of the few areas where cost savings are readily quantifiable and possible to achieve in health care).