If you are a resident of Kerala, you may soon be able to access your medical history with the click of a button, according to an IANS report.
Health Minister KK Shailaja has said it will be implemented in two phases. Out of the 14 districts, the first phase will include creating data base for 7 districts. However, this will take nearly two years to complete.
The programme will be kick-started by CM Pinarayi Vijayan and the details of residents will be keyed in using a tablet computer. So, every time a person meets a state doctor, all the medical records will be keyed in the computer and linked to laboratories. For now, the private sector isn't included in the project.
The project is being implemented with Rs 87 crore funds from the Centre while the rest will be added by the State government. The data will be stored in the State data centre.
The State Data Centre is touted to be one of the core infrastructure components to offer proficient electronic delivery of government services. It serves as a central repository of database of the state storing citizen information, state intranet portal, secure online data storage and so on.
But, such data is often vulnerable and if stringent security measures aren't taken it could be susceptible to hacking. Even in the United States, Great Britain, and Germany, the national centralised server model of healthcare data has seen poor response, owing to issues such as privacy and security.
In 2015, we saw the Kerala government website - www.kerala.gov - being hacked. The hacked page carried the identity of the hacker who was reportedly a malicious mind from Pakistan. Needless to say, several other government websites have been privy to such attacks.
Post the attacks, the government did setup security operations at the two state data centres for 24x7 monitoring at hacking. However, with such private information going online, we aren’t' sure if everyone will be comfortable. This brings us to the question of consent.
A user has the right to decide if his or her medical records can be put online. And, there is no word on if government will give residents the option to opt-out. For instance, in Australia, patients have been given the chance to opt-out if they don't wish their personal medical records to go online.
On the brighter side, online medical records could be a step towards the medical devices era we've been hearing about. These devices when linked to your data can alert your doctor or medical staff during emergencies. Apple probably also envisages such a future for its Watch. However, the question is how efficiently such a system can work without any errors?