By Ragnhild Bassøe Gundersen
Too many health tech projects are based on what health institutions want and need with very little involvement from the patients. It is about time to utilize the patients' knowledge and experience.
Studies done in Norway shows that patients want to be more in control of their own health. They also want to be reassured that all health professionals involved have access to their health data as this both enhances and provides a secure treatment of the patients health data. An interdisciplinary health tech solution must adequately safeguard the patient's privacy and safety.
With GDPR, patients have the right to receive their personal data in a machine-readable format (data portability). APIs from health apps are made available. Thus, patients will be able to collect data from various Electronic Patient Records (EPRs) and health apps and store them in one solution.
It is only a matter of when and not whether patients own their own EPR and their health data. In order for such a solution to work, health professionals must, through the patient's consent, be given access to the parts of the EPR they need in order to carry out the necessary clinical examination and possible treatments. Then various specialists, nurses, physiotherapists, etc., who have gained access to the patient's EPR, can collaborate within the same EPR.
Such a solution should be problem-oriented (1). It must be clear what problems the patient has, and each problem must display an overview of the journal notes and other data belonging to each problem.
This will not only give a great overview of the patient's health history, all that is written about the patient will be written once, only. Errors can quickly be detected and corrected.
With a problem-oriented EPR time spent on administrative tasks is reduced and health professionals can spend more time taking care of the patient.
Reference not available online:
1. Bassøe C-F. Datahygiene. Tidsskr Nor Legeforen 1995;115:252-5.