Overview: The first-ever federal privacy standards to protect patients' medical records and other health information provided to health plans, doctors, hospitals and other health care providers took effect on April 14, 2003. Developed by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), these new standards provide patients with access to their medical records and more control over how their pe...

In today’s health care, a growing interest in more active patient involvement in their treatment is emerging. Along with the fact that electronic health records is now commonly used by most health care provides, a unique possibility to improve patient involvement through personal health records exists. This paper investigates the premisses under which a personal health record system is to be im...

Past studies have shown that personal subjective happiness is associated with various macro- and micro-level background factors, including environmental conditions, such as weather and the economic situation, and personal health behaviors, such as smoking and exercise. We contribute to this literature of happiness studies by using a geospatial approach to examine both macro and micro links to p...

BACKGROUND Adoption of electronic health record systems has increased the availability of patient-level electronic health information. OBJECTIVE To examine public support for secondary uses of electronic health information under different consent arrangements. DESIGN National experimental survey to examine perceptions of uses of electronic health information according to patient consent (ob...

Personal health records (PHRs) have many benefits, including the ability to increase involvement of patients in their care, which provides better healthcare outcomes. Although issues related to usability of PHRs are a significant barrier to adoption, there is a paucity of research in this area. Thus, the researchers explored consumers' perspective on the usability of two commercially available ...