OpenNotes Program Expands Access to Personal Health Information
I know I’m spoiled about access to personal health information. I get most of my medical care through Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) in Boston, which offers PatientSite, a patient portal where I’ve been able to see my laboratory and imaging results, correspond with my doctor by email, manage my medications, request appointments, and so on for many years. (Developers and physicians Danny Sands and John Halamka describe the PatientSite project in a book chapter available online from the Commonwealth Fund.)
Since 2010, PatientSite has also offered me access to my doctor’s notes following our visits because BIDMC was one of three systems that piloted the OpenNotes program. The OpenNotes community is growing; the Veterans Health Administration (VA) has recently joined the initiative, which now includes BIDMC, Geisinger Health System, MDAnderson Cancer Center, and UW Medicine’s Harbor Medical Center.
On her blog, Shared Health Data, Sue Woods—general internist, informaticist, and researcher for the VA and Oregon Health Science University—wonders if the VA will prove to be the tipping point for OpenNotes. I hope so! I can say that having had access to my own health information, it’s hard to imagine giving it up. There’s no turning back once you’ve experienced “nothing about me without me.”