Medical data privacy: americans not that worried and willing to share

Truven Health in partnership with NPR addressed the potentially prickly issues surrounding medical data privacy. In August, more than 3,000 adults participated in this poll. You can access the full report here; in a nutshell, it shows it is much less of an issue that previously thought.

Revealingly, most participants go to doctors that already store their patients’ data digitally, so few can claim to be surprised by this. Chances are you yourself signed a confidentiality waiver so that your doctor can share medical data with the concerned insurance companies.

On the left is the percentage of people that are concerned with the medical records’ privacy. Those worried are actually not so many: between 10 - 16 %. Among those concerned, insurers seem to be the least trustworthy or, alternatively, potentially more interested in misusing private medical information. Doctors and employers either are not perceived as having any direct benefits from misusing medical records or are deemed as being quite trustworthy.

Another interesting tidbit comes from answers people give when asked if they personally experienced a privacy breach. Only about 5% were aware of being in a situation where their medical data were accessed without permission or in some way the security was compromised.

For us, the most interesting part of this NPR-Truven Health poll is the fact that two-thirds of people said they would be willing to share their health information with researchers. This shows that our project is on the right track and people have no misgivings about sharing data such as these, as long as personal details are erased and, presumably, it is used for non-profit purposes.

CashDoctor® 2.0 is about consumers that are ready to SHARE with their community vital information regarding the actual cost of medical services and take back their local healthcare industry. We invite you to be a part of this coming 2 Trillion Dollar revolution.