On 23/08/2016 4:53 PM, Antony Broughton Barry wrote: >> On 19 Aug 2016, at 6:49 PM, Frank O'Connor <francisoconn...@bigpond.com> >> wrote: >> >> Pretty much EVERY digital health initiative over the last 20 years has come >> to the same sordid end - hamstrung from within and without by politics, >> incompetence and the old ‘solution in search of a problem’ syndrome … but >> they do keep trying. > Being old enough to have doctors giving me written reviews of my health > situation every year (or more often sometimes) and sending me off to various > specialists I have come to keeping my various reports on Evernote and filling > the Health app on my iPhone with piles of data from various monitoring > devices (iWatch, Fitbit, fat monitoring scales, glucose monitors, > thermometers, blood pressure etc) usually to the confusion of my various > health professionals. I was surprised last week having my biannual diabetes > check to have my GP somewhat apologetically enrolling me in the governments > eHealth database system. I though it had collapsed through lack of interest > but obviously GPs are being given some incentive to promote it.
Tony, Your retirement and mine are somewhat different. I've spent a decent chunk of the past couple of years (it actually started when I was still at work in 2011) railing against the PCEHR/myHealthRecord. I was asked to chair the Health Committee of the Australian Privacy Foundation and I've been using that platform to point out the failings of the systems from a privacy perspective, but equally importantly, pointing out how useless it is. IMHO, risking one's privacy must be worth the risk. Zero or negative value, as in the case of the MyHR, means that the risk just isn't worth it. If you want to see what I really think of the system start here: https://www.privacy.org.au/Campaigns/MyHR/info.html I'm working on another section pointing out just how useless the Shared Health Summary is. This is the only part that might have some value, but doesn't. In fact t's quite possibly dangerous. The data can't be trusted. To respond to your last sentence: The MyHR has so far cost at least $1.5 billion. The government has never told us if it has ever been used to improve health care or if it has been used to save money. What they have told us is that they intend to make it compulsory for everyone to have a MyHR. This will be a bit difficult because the system was designed from the start to be Opt-in. They are in the process changing it to opt-out, which creates various problems. Making it compulsory is somewhat ambitious. And yes, GPs are being given some incentive to promote it. They are required to upload or update Shared Health Summaries of a certain proportion of their patients every month if the wish to be eligible for an incentive payment of $5000 over the year. The fact that the government can't monitor this activity and rely on doctors to 'fess up if they fail to meet their target, speaks volumes about their desperation (the government's). GPs are already pissed off because of the Medicare rebate freeze. To put this into perspective, there are 5000 medical practices in Australia which means the government is likely to spend $250million per year getting GPs to upload some (possibly dubious or low value) data to the MyHR. They don't have to use the system, just upload data. On top of that, the government has created the Australian Digital Health agency at a cost of $150pa. This agency will run the MyHR and be the main organistion promoting eHealth in Australia. So that's $400millionpa on top of $1billion spent already. For no known benefit to Australian Taxpayers. Gives you some idea why I'm rather pissed off. BTW, your solution to sharing your health data is an excellent one. It might not suit everyone, but there are other solutions for other people. And it's totally "Personally Controlled" Also BTW, your GP should have asked your opinion and consent - maybe they did. And now you are registered for a MyHealthRecord, you can never de-register, only deactivate. And if you want to know who can legally get at your health data, without you knowing, see here: Especially the bit about "Section 70 Disclosure for law enforcement purposes, etc." -- Regards brd Bernard Robertson-Dunn Sydney Australia email: b...@iimetro.com.au web: www.drbrd.com web: www.problemsfirst.com Blog: www.problemsfirst.com/blog _______________________________________________ Link mailing list Link@mailman.anu.edu.au http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/link
