Store Online Medical Health Records

ML Baker at Ziff Davis Internet writes “Edward Fotsch, CEO of Medem, a company providing Internet-based services to doctors, this week reached out to patients with the chance to create their own online, password-protected personal health records.

Medem Inc. was founded by the American Medical Association and other medical societies as a way to help clinicians communicate with patients online. The PHR (personal health record) service is a natural extension of that.

Fotsch said. “Instead of filling it out in a waiting room, where you don’t have your information, you do it from your home at your own convenience, and you only have to do it once.” After creating their record, patients can print out cards with instructions allowing emergency workers to access relevant information online instead of by quizzing distraught family members.

Patients will pay nothing for Medem’s service, called iHealthRecord. Instead, physicians will pay about $25 a month.”

iHealthRecord is a no-cost, secure and confidential interactive record that allows you to store, update and share health information with your physician or in an emergency situation.

One wonders if patients will keep accurate records and whether physicians will consider them reliable, and there are the privacy issues as well.