Devising strategies for ensuring social media are not used in ways that violate patient privacy is one of the top trends for 2011, says Lisa Gallagher, senior director of privacy and security at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society.
A presidential council's call for creation of a universal exchange language based on XML as a way to make electronic health records systems interoperable and ease the secure exchange of data is overly simplistic and impractical, some critics say.
Healthcare privacy and security issues rose to the forefront in 2010 thanks, in large part, to the HITECH Act, which led to many new regulations as well as a public list of major health information breaches.
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a healthcare privacy case involving whether Vermont can ban the use of certain prescriber-identifiable data in the marketing of pharmaceuticals.
"The environment that started by supporting whistleblowers ... is essentially morphing into 'Gee, we as an organization need to be completely transparent, whether we want to or not,'" says Cal Slemp, managing director of Protiviti.
When it comes to sizing up the privacy agenda for 2011, the tone at the top of organizations is all about improving data security, says privacy expert and lawyer Lisa Sotto.
A recently released presidential council report, while raising important issues, oversimplifies the challenges involved in securely exchanging health information, says Joyce Sensmeier, vice president for informatics at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society.
The Healthcare Information Trust Alliance has unveiled an updated version of its Common Security Framework reflecting the latest regulations and security practices.
Cyber criminals typically will move on to a target that is much less secure but those behind advanced persistent threats will spend months if not years trying to penetrate an IT system until they succeed, says Dmitri Alperovitch, McAfee Labs threat research vice president.
When the HITECH Act was enacted early in 2009, much was made of its provisions calling for tougher enforcement of the HIPAA privacy and security rules. But we're still waiting for ramped-up enforcement to begin.
Incidents such as the WikiLeaks disclosures and resulting fallout push leaders to redefine their data protection agenda for 2011 and think about their organizations' vulnerabilities.
Expanding use of secure messaging as well as remote access to information systems are key 2011 IT priorities for Shriners Hospitals for Children, says Bill Bria, M.D., chief medical information officer.
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