The Health Plans’ take on PHRs
In what’s starting to look like a trend, the health insurance industry has also jumped on the portable PHR bandwagon. This slide, taken from their Dec. 13 press release, is remarkable only by how closely it tracks a typical CCR. What’s more interesting, is the health plans’ interpretation of “portable”.
Both the release and the 2-page PHR Backgrounder it references are vague about the transfer process. Will a Dossia or MedCommons user be able to subscribe to their health plan PHR? Will it be delivered electronically as a PDF-H or CXP message?
The value of a concise and up-to-date patient clinical summary is evident to any user of a modern-day EHR. It’s safe to say that as standards and transport problems are worked out, information will flow to the PHR that is best able to separate wheat from chaff and to make the current clinical summary accessible to all the relevant members of the care team - including the consumer.
What role will the clinicians play in updating the PHR? Will they interact directly with the PHR or will they live safely behind their EHR firewall and pass that role to the health plans and pharmacy benefits managers?
Friday, December 15, 2006