Troubles with HIPAAs

No, we're not talking about the animals in the zoo.  And no, we're not making a reference to an old Star Strek episode.  And no, this is not going to be your standard HIPAA discussion suggesting the proper solutions that will fix the medical community's privacy issues.

Despite the regulations that HIPAA is attempting to address, patient privacy is being violated on a regular basis, despite our best intentions.  How?  To answer that question, let's step back for a moment and talk a bit about computers and their connections to the Internet.

Look up near the top of your browser's window.  See the URL bar? That place where the "www" appears (most of the time)?  If the URL doen't have a prefix of "https://",  the information flowing back and forth between your browser and the Internet isn't encrypted and can readily be visible to anyone with minimal computer skills and a desire to look at what you are doing. More generally, all connections to your computer, unless encrypted, are easily viewable by third parties. That includes  your email, text messages, instant messages, and web pages.

What's my point?  Well, despite the fact that most medical software transmits information in encrypted form, there are loose ends that leak private patient information.  Where are those leaks, and how do we plug them?

The biggest leak of confidential patient information from a medical practice is email. Have you ever asked a colleague for a consultation via email?  Have you ever asked a patient a question or sent information to a patient via email? Well, unless you used a special email program provided by your institution that takes extra steps to prevent prying eyes from reading it, you should assume the patient's confidential information has been compromised.

The take-away is this: Don't send confidential patient information using text messaging, email, or instant messaging, unless those programs are explicitly certified to be HIPAA compliant.

Are Blackberries good for you?

Remember the Wang word processor? If you're not old enough to remember, let me fill you in:

Back in the Olden Days, before the PC existed, there was a company called Wang. Wang's business was building word processor machines. They were very good machines. Eventually, "Wang" and "word processor" became virtually synonymous. Wang prospered.


Although they might not have seen it that way, Wang was building PCs. But PCs that only ran one program: the Wang word processing software. Wang's word processing machine was expensive, so only companies bought its products. One day, a group of hobbyists started putting together hardware very similar to Wang's, but with two big differences: their machines could run many different software programs, and, best of all, their machine was inexpensive. Inexpensive enough that individuals could afford them. Soon, other groups started building similar machines. Before long, two very smart people started a company called Apple, and the era of the personal computer was born.

Meanwhile, back at Wang, management didn't understand that their hardware and software could be supplanted by the PC. And while they had a huge head start building machines that could have easily been turned into PC's, they never saw the writing on the wall.  So Wang hit the wall, and never took part in an industry that could have made them successful beyond their wildest dreams. They weren't lacking smarts. They were lacking vision.

Unfortunately, this story can be retold many times over with different names.

Which brings me to the Blackberry. My friends, what happened to Wang is now happening to RIM, the manufacturer of Blackberry phones. Sad to say, while RIM virtually owned the smartphone (oops, I forgot I wasn't going to use that term any longer) market, they have lost it to Apple and Google.

"Yes, but the [Wang / Blackberry] runs [a better word processor / more secure phone software] than Apple's." said the management of [Wang / RIM]. But the writing is on the wall.

Don't consume Blackberries.  Apples are better for you.

That last statement, while true, should not be construed as an endorsement.

Be sure to read our next post: "Troubles with HIPAAs"

Smartphones, tablets, and the medical professions

Two powerful trends are converging to make portable devices increasingly important in medicine:

1. The computing power available to these small devices is growing by leaps and bounds. You are now able to hold way more computing power in your pocket than your desktop computer had just a handful of years ago. And the sophistication of the software available to run on them leaves that desktop compter in the dust.
2. Physicians, especially recent medical school graduates, have become comfortable with (some would use the term "addicted to") smartphones and tablets.  Rare indeed is the young physician who doesn't carry a smartphone and use it throughout the day.

These two trends, of course, are not independent of each other. In fact they feed off each other.  The tech-savvy physician with a penchant for gadgets, therefore, often looks for new ways to use them both during their workday and afterwards as well (assuming there is any afterwords worth talking about).

In this blog we will be talking about the use of smartphones and tablets, and how they relate to people's lives with an emphasis, although not exclusively, on medical professionals.

By the way, we are tired of writing "smartphone."  In fact, we don't even like the term. They're not smart (yet). So we will use the term "phone" as a generic reference to them. Besides, we believe that the the old style cell phone, often referred to as a "feature phone" is on its way out.

Be sure to read our next post: "Are Blackberries good for you?"