We’re excited to share the topic and questions for this week’s #HITsm chat happening Friday, 7/9 at Noon ET (9 AM PT). This week’s chat will be hosted by Sarah Krüg (@sarahkrug1) on the topic “Is Transparency the Most Disruptive Innovation in Healthcare?”
Trust is one of the most important building blocks in healthcare, and takes time to build, seconds to break and an eternity to repair. Trust is the cornerstone of the interactions that a patient has with the healthcare system, and when trust is tarnished it can lead to a reduction in the utilization of healthcare services, fuel health inequities, stifle innovation and ultimately impact health outcomes.
Mistrust can lead to skepticism and a lack of confidence that the healthcare system cares about a person. The sad reality is that trust across healthcare has been on the decline over the past few decades. There’s been growing mistrust in science, and whether both the good and bad are truly made transparent.
Trust in authoritative sources has been on the decline as patients question whether organizations can be influenced by ulterior motives. A fragmented healthcare system, lack of care coordination and a growing trend of episodic care have also affected the sacred patient: doctor relationship.
Health technology is also outpacing security, privacy, and reliability and can have a major ripple effect on trust with a lack of transparency into what type of health data is being collected, how it’s utilized and shared, whether it’s truly being protected over time, and how it may lead to unintended consequences.
Transparency is the interwoven thread to rebuilding trust in healthcare, and it’s exciting to see progress being made as we liberate data; although there are wrinkles that still to be ironed out. The 21st Century Cures Act demonstrates a tremendous shift from paternalistic medicine to participatory medicine, as clinical notes are made transparent to patients real-time. Other examples of the healthcare transparency movement include information on hospital quality and safety that’s available, clinical trial data sharing and CMS’s Price Transparency Initiative.
Transparency is the most disruptive innovation of the 21st century; however, the implementation of “transparency” is often lost in translation. We live in an era of information overload, where transparency efforts are often too complex to understand, tucked away in places where no one looks, and fragmented so that’s it difficult for patients to use the information in a meaningful way. In addition, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) predates modern times and the rapid proliferation of patient data and innovative methods of leveraging that data.
As we pave the path forward, it’s important for us to design for trust, redefine informed consent and recognize the opportunity we have to build a true partnership with patients. We’re at a pivotal moment in digital health where transparency has the opportunity to transform healthcare as we know it. The question is-who are the pioneers that will lead the way and will the laggards survive?
Join us for this week’s #HITsm chat where we’ll discuss the following questions and topics.
Topics for this week’s #HITsm Chat:
T1: How often do you read terms and conditions and/or privacy policies before using technology, and has the “fine print” ever deterred you from proceeding with use? #HITsm
T2: What do you wish all patients knew about digital health and “patient data” that they probably aren’t aware of now? In spirit of our theme around transparency, what should we shed more light on? #HITsm
T3: Can you share any health tech examples, where transparency efforts have been satisfactory (or even exceeded expectations)? Are there good examples of transparency outside of healthcare that we can learn from and potentially apply? #HITsm
T4: Imagine we are co-designing “Health Tech Transparency Guiding Principles” that will be adopted across digital health. What guiding principle would you suggest we include? #HITsm
T5: What are your thoughts on patient ownership of their data? What are pros and cons? #HITsm
Bonus Question: On a scale of 1(poor) to 5 (excellent), how would you rate transparency in digital health? Why? #HITsm
Upcoming #HITsm Chat Schedule
7/16 – TBD
TBD
We look forward to learning from the #HITsm community! As always, let us know if you’d like to host a future #HITsm chat or if you know someone you think we should invite to host.
If you’re searching for the latest #HITsm chat, you can always find the latest #HITsm chat and schedule of chats here.
