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Healthcare’s Digital Divide Ushers in a New Year of Patient Distrust

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bbby Angela Guess

According to a new press release, “Black Book’s national panel poll of consumers aims to judge patient adoption and acceptance of technology, as well as measure those impacts on the healthcare industry. The patient survey, conducted from September through December 2016, asked consumers to evaluate the technology they were exposed to, know of or interacted with as an active patient in the last twelve months. 57 percent of consumers with contact experience to hospital, physician or ancillary provider’s technology in 2016 report being skeptical of the overall benefits of health information technologies such as patient portals, mobile apps, and electronic health records mainly because of recently reported data hacking and a perceived lack of privacy protection by providers. The national survey which included 12,090 adult consumers.”

The release goes on, “As the amount of available health data is increasing so is the hesitancy for consumers to share that information due to industry privacy and security issues. The unwillingness of patients to comprehensively divulge all their medical information rose to 87% in Q4 2016.   Fewer consumers at this point in time do not want their digital health histories to extend beyond their physician and hospital, previously measured in 2013 at 66% who were willing to divulge all personal health data to achieve enhanced care. Especially alarming to respondents were the concerns that their pharmacy prescriptions (90 percent), mental health notes (99 percent) and chronic condition (81 percent) data is being shared beyond their chosen provider and payer to retailers, employers, and or the government without their acknowledgement.”

Read more at PR Newswire.

Photo credit: Black Book

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