Google Medical Records Raise Privacy Concerns

Boston (dbTechno) - Google is working with the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio to start up a pilot program to store patient health records online. This is causing a great deal of privacy concerns among people as they are unsure of how safe their medical records will be on Google.

The pilot program that Google and the Cleveland Clinic have set up will consist of around 1,500 to 10,000 patient volunteers.

They will all take part to store certain health records online.

The information that will be going online will consist of prescriptions, allergies, lab test results, etc.

All will be stored in a Google account which only the patients will have passwords to access.

The idea behind it is to give control to the patients so that they can have their own medical records to refer to whenever needed.

Dr. Martin David, spokesman for the Cleveland Clinic stated “What we are trying to do is exchange information between isolated electronic medical systems and when we do that the patient gets a benefit. The patient is making the decision when information moves from one system to another.”

Many are worried about the privacy of this information though, as people have come out and stated that it is possiblie that hackers could get in and steal medical records, prescriptions, etc.

They are also questioning whether or not Google will sell the data and use the data commercially, though Google has refuted this claim already.