Patients — not physicians and hospitals — deserve to own their personal medical data, according to Eric Topol, MD, director of La Jolla, Calif.-based Scripps Translational Science Institute.
Dr. Topol, a cardiologist, professor and author, took to Twitter Oct. 8 to post an image of 24 reasons patients should be able to control their medical data, accompanied by the caption "Your. Medical. Data." For Dr. Topol, patient ownership of medical information is essential — "access or 'control' of your data is not adequate," he wrote.
His reasons included:
- "It's your body"
- "It's being widely sold, stolen and hacked. And you don't know it."
- "Your EHR was designed to maximize billing, not to help your health"
- "You need to own your data; it should be a civil right"
- "It could save your life"
The tweet had garnered 1,299 likes and 817 retweets at Becker's Hospital Review's time of publication.
To access the full image, click here.