Medical Technology

The Washington Times: Editorials:

The answer to these questions, in large measure, is that the world's greatest doctors, armed with history's most powerful medical tools, operate within a system that is inefficient and disconnected. It's as if we're putting our best jet pilots in the cockpits of antiquated World War II fighters. This antiquated system disserves our patients and providers. At a time when industries around the globe are tapping the power of technology to transform how they do business, our health-care system is investing less in these technologies than every sector except construction, education and mining. You know this already. Every time you walk into a doctor's office and fill out the same paperwork with your same personal information it is a reminder that we can do better. Every time you have to wait for test results to be hand-carried from one department to another, it's a reminder that we can do better. And every time you cool your heels at a pharmacy while they place a call to a doctor's office because the pharmacist can't decipher the handwriting on a prescription, it's a reminder we can do better.

I agree that there is a lot that can be done in this area. A big stubling block though is privacy concerns. Any automation of medical records holds an inherent chance that some of these records will fail to be properly secured, and that worries a lot of people. While I understand that concern, the truth is that banking information, which was amoung the first industries to heavily leverage IT, is far more significant, and far more useful to most unscrupulous individuals.