Hospitals Begin Data-Mining Patients 162
schwit1 (797399) sends word of a new and exciting use for all of the data various entities are collecting about you. From the article: You may soon get a call from your doctor if you've let your gym membership lapse, made a habit of ordering out for pizza or begin shopping at plus-sized stores. That's because some hospitals are starting to use detailed consumer data to create profiles on current and potential patients to identify those most likely to get sick, so the hospitals can intervene before they do. Acxiom Corp. (ACXM) and LexisNexis are two of the largest data brokers who collect such information on individuals. They say their data are supposed to be used only for marketing, not for medical purposes or to be included in medical records. While both sell to health insurers, they said it's to help those companies offer better services to members.
Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Insightful)
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I doubt they know what to actually do with this data other than tell you to exercise more and eat better.
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Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:4, Funny)
My doctor says it is more about the ratio between the two. You want to have a 6:1 ratio of HDL to LDL. Total amount of each isn't so important.
But that was a VA doctor, so maybe I'm just lucky to be alive. ;^)
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"Lots of math. It involves looking at historical data, attempting to identify patterns and critical factors, then using that model for predictive purposes."
This will fail (to help people). It may be useful as exploratory analysis, but without theory backing it up it is nothing but curve fitting. It will be even worse than current epidemiology (which has a horrible track record, possibly even worse than psychology) that is at least somewhat informed by theory and expert opinion. This new way of incorporating
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:4, Insightful)
So far the largest factor for readmission has been if their house as more then one floor and if they live alone.
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However you can build a theory based off patterns you find. The multiple floor living alone factor for instance was tied back to minor falls when moving between floors which could become serious if there was no one around. Having
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You're wrong, you shouldn't trust your doctor AT ALL. Your life/health and privacy are far too important to do so.
Your doctor is no better of a person than anyone at the insurance company.
You need to understand that every single person at a hospital is also a person, not some mythical creature who actually cares about you.
99.9% of the doctors created today are just as scummy as anyone else. The age where doctors cared has not existed during my life time, if it ever did. The hippocratic oath is a joke at
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99.9% of the doctors created today are just as scummy as anyone else. The age where doctors cared has not existed during my life time, if it ever did. The hippocratic oath is a joke at best, nothing more than lip service.
You're so full of shit it's coming out of your mouth instead of your asshole.
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Interesting)
Angie's List was created because separating the lousy doctors from the very few good ones is almost impossible. The AMA has lobbied successfully to make it illegal for a patient to find out the malpractice history of physicians.
If you're looking for a new doctor, the best thing you can do is talk to some local nurses. They know which ones are on the ball, and which ones are flat out dangerous.
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The AMA has lobbied successfully to make it illegal for a patient to find out the malpractice history of physicians.
This may be true for your state, but not in MA. You can go here to review the profile of any physician that has ever been registered in the state of Massachusetts [state.ma.us]. These profiles include malpractice, disciplinary action, and criminal history. This information is primary and authoritative; the site that hospitals and other healthcare providers use to check on their doctors, and what the public sees, is one in the same. In addition, anyone is allowed to call the Board of Medicine to request specific details a
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Thank you for that medically astute observation Dr sribe.
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:4, Funny)
No, you're full of shit. And, to prove it, I'll now provide exactly twice as much evidence as you did to the contrary:
...
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Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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I work IT at a large practice for a specific uncommon specialty. It employs 30+ doctors. There's quite a range of different types... I don't know if it's representative of doctors as a whole but it is humanizing indeed.
There's the ancient high-brow jerk who disdains to speak with a "computer nerd with no degree" but the guy knows his medicine, despite the attitude. There's the cute lady who muddles through just barely, but has great "people skills". There's the hot-shot european-educated surgeon with a
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Your basic point is correct but a tad misanthropic. I'd suggest most doctors care, but that care is so diluted that it's not in your best interest to put any reliance on it. We recently discovered our medical group, which we've been in for many years, could not be bothered to transfer the kids immunization records from the pediatricians office to their primary doctor (all in the same group) when the kids became adults.
As other posts have noted, the only care you can rely on will come from the insurance comp
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You're wrong, you shouldn't trust your doctor AT ALL. Your life/health and privacy are far too important to do so.
Your doctor is no better of a person than anyone at the insurance company.
You need to understand that every single person at a hospital is also a person, not some mythical creature who actually cares about you.
99.9% of the doctors created today are just as scummy as anyone else. The age where doctors cared has not existed during my life time, if it ever did. The hippocratic oath is a joke at best, nothing more than lip service.
I don't trust my doctor with my personal information because of some vague oath any more than I do any politician to support and defend the constitution. I trust my doctor with my personal information because he has a legal obligation to not disclose that information to other parties without my consent.
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Now let's talk about your misguided (not to mention grammatically awkward) notion that "Your doctor is no better of a person than anyone at the insurance company." What a remarkably naive notion that is. While there, is to be sure, a wide range of expertise (and character) among physicians, comparing those two populations is almost pointless. What is an
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Insightful)
What frightens me is the idea that they could get the wrong information and give that to my doctor or insurance company. For instance, a couple of weeks ago, my car broke down. While it was in the shop, I was getting a ride to work with a co-worker. They stopped at Dunkin' Donuts every morning and got a coffee and a donut, and I would usually pay for it (along with their gas) in exchange for giving me a ride. This means my purchase history would show me buying a coffee and a donut every morning for around five days, even though I didn't actually consume either of them.
With a system like this in place, I'm sure my insurance company would see that and go "He's buying donuts, raise the premiums!" even though the donut I'm not consuming doesn't really effect me in any way.
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Insightful)
Couple that with "eventually consistent" databases and you have a recipe for disaster.
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You buy something as mundane as a coffee and a donut with a smart card? and how come the history is shared with everyone, not just your bank and the NSA?
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Interesting)
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Oops. One step too far. You fell over the believable cliff.
Come on. While I'm not happy about the rampant data mining going on everywhere and the premise of TFA is faintly ridiculous (we know where all the really sick people are - they're in and out of the ER all the time - we don't need no stinkin' data mining) you just might imagine that somebody is going to do a few checks internally.
Even in this Evil Pantopicon, one pack of cigs isn't going to flag anything. One pack of cigs every day, OTOH, just mi
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They didn't get rich by writing checks
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:4, Interesting)
You're still thinking rationaly. You can't do that around these people.
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You're still thinking rationaly. You can't do that around these people.
Sorry. You're correct. My bad.
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He didn't say the insurance company would believe he was smoking on the sly, just that they would use that as an excuse to not pay out.
Insurance companies are notorious for not paying based on flimsy excuses.
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Insurance companies start dinging us for doughnuts? Cops like doughnuts and have guns and pepper spray. Just sayin.
Re:Doesn't give warm fuzzies (Score:5, Interesting)
What frightens me is the idea that they could get the wrong information and give that to my doctor or insurance company.
To make matters worse, it seems impossible to get erroneous information removed. For example: My wife was misdiagnosed with asthma by an allergist. From then on, until she died 10 years later, every doctor asked her about her asthma, and she would tell them about the error. Even now, 8 years *after* she died, I still get flyers in the mail from BC/BS about asthma addressed to her.
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It's even worse for people with chronic pain conditions. All it takes is one medical provider to flag the patient as a drug seeker and that person's life becomes a living hell.
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http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/understanding/consumers/index.html
Who must follow these [HIPAA] laws:
Health Care Clearinghouses—entities that process nonstandard health information they receive from another entity into a standard (i.e., standard electronic format or data content), or vice versa.
In addition, Business Associates of Covered Entities must follow parts of the HIPAA regulations.
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THAT would be a wonderful application of the HIPAA laws that so far seem to only generate a ream of papers (not for me to fill out or sign, just informational) when I visit the doctor's office...
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The HIPPA rules are quite importnat, they do a lot to protect privacy in that data is not simply allowed to be shared without consent (unless you are incapacitated in which case a doctor in an emergency can get just about anything he wants. There are rules for tracking access to sensitive information along with auditing of the stated reason. Its pretty good stuff.
That said, it only requires people to provide a certain level of data security.... since, say OpenSSH is an industry standard used for protectin
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Now that would be great! Kind of like the way that RMS turned copyright against itself with the GPL
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It sounds like public disclosure of private facts. - http://privacy.uslegal.com/wha... [uslegal.com]
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Time to Legislate Data Mining (Score:3, Insightful)
If we criminalized collection of data without specific field level consent, we could end this invasion of privacy.
Re:Time to Legislate Data Mining (Score:4, Insightful)
We could start by requiring mandatory reporting to a central agency and then a way for that central agency to send a
unsubscribe back to the data collector.
A government website where you can log in and see any place your name, social, phone number, etc.. is being used
and a way to opt-out would be great. I'm still getting mail from people who haven't lived in my house for 5+ years.
I think the 2 big problems with this plan is:
1) Do we really want another giant government program/website.
2) Sometimes the information collected is incomplete. Sometimes they only have a phone number, sometimes only an
address, maybe just an email, sometimes less than that. So you would need a secure way to verify a phone number,
an address, and a social at a bare minimum.
It does seem crazy that stuff gets out and there is no way to recall your information. I have facebook friends
who are now dead and yet their page is still active, people can still post to them, etc...
Re:Time to Legislate Data Mining (Score:5, Insightful)
We can call it Big Brother. That's a nice name which implies someone looking out for your welfare, right?
Sorry, citizen, all information once collected can and will be used against you.
In order to maximize corporate profits and governmental control, this information is vital to national interests.
Re:Time to Legislate Data Mining (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't allow for consent at all, if you do, every contract will simply require your consent in order for service to be rendered.
The only way you stop data mining is to make it illegal, no exceptions. Its really no different than outlawing slavery. You can't allow someone to sign away their privacy or bodies to slavery otherwise they'll be duped, tricked or forced into a situation where they have to sign away those rights even if they don't want to.
Want a bank loan? All banks will require you to allow them to mine your data or no loan, so you don't actually have a choice if you want a loan. But it'll just be extended to everything. Cell phone companies already do it. Power companies will start, and they'll add that you have to allow ANY and ALL of their affiliates to mine you as well ... and then everyone will become an affiliate of the power company.
Nope, the only solution is to 100% outlaw data mining, which just isn't going to happen because the general public is basically too ignorant of the issue to care.
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So it's not data mining that's the problem, rather, it's the way some corporations and institutions use data mining for their best interest and not in the best interest of those whose data they have.
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Few issues are completely one sided, but slavery is about as close as you can get. That roof over their heads is just cheap rationalising to help the masters feel good. Like patting yourself on the back for feeding someone a fish today, when you could have taught them how to fish but you won't because you want to keep control. You even go as far as stopping them from figuring out how to fish on their own, on the notion that they can't handle such dangerous knowledge. Slavery wasn't even really good for
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Unlike minimum wage employers, the owner felt some minimal need to protect his substantial investment so they also provided basic healthcare.
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I agree that what you describe makes "consent" useless, but you don't necessarily need to outlaw it.
Just require that:
- any commercial entity that stores information on individuals (with NO exceptions whatsoever) has to provide said individuals a full dump of the data once per some time period upon request, with no conditions or cost attached, along with a list of everyone they've given it to.
- the entity must correct any incorrect information, and can't distribute any information regarding an individual un
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If we criminalized collection of data without specific field level consent, we could end this invasion of privacy.
No you wouldn't. I deal with marketing software all the time. They get around it very easily. They don't log your name or any "directly" identifying information. Keep in mind, they don't care who you are... They just want to sell you stuff. So to remain in compliance with the law, you log all the data in an "anonymized" database. You log identifiable information like name, phone, email in a different database and make it "secure" Then you wait... at some point they will click a link or request some info tha
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Fortunately, that strategy does not work for HIPAA protected health information. Any identifying number or information fragment that allows you to connect back to the original patient is not allowed. In small communities, this can be as little as age, diagnosis, and zip code.
I expect some interesting court cases over this.
Donut want (Score:5, Funny)
Thanks a lot autocorrect. Now my insurance premiums are going up.
I am a professional translator, me (Score:2, Insightful)
...and so I can tell that by "better services", they mean "withdraw coverage or raise the insurance premium the millisecond your risk increases".
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More along the lines of "increase CEO bonuses". The only goal corporations really pursue.
HIPAA? (Score:2)
Re:HIPAA? (Score:5, Insightful)
You have it backwards.
The hospital is taking marketing data and using it for pseudo healthcare related reasons.
They aren't giving Taco Bell your health data from the hospital, they are giving the hospital your Taco Bell receipts.
The hospital then uses this to figure out new ways to rip you off for their already ridiculously over priced health services.
(My wife is a doctor, I'm more than qualified to comment on how ridiculously over priced their rip off services are)
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Yes, heath insurance /= heathcare /= health. Finally people are starting to understand this.
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My wife is a doctor as well and I can assure you, physicians have no clue how to properly price medical services.
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This seems as good a place as any to bring this up. Have other people been getting creepy robocalls from people claiming to be affiliated with their insurance companies?
CSB: Robocall from a 'bot that knows my name, and it claims I need to fill out a survey for my health insurer. I ignore it. Bot calls back a few months later and says it just wants to be sure I'm getting the health care I need, etc.
I do some digging
only a paranoid nutjob would think (Score:1)
that corporations and governments are watching your every move, putting it into databases to penalize you over it's content later. As to if it's accurate, well forget that! You are always guilty before the corporate overlords.
think of it as a new 'convenience charge'.
Not likely (Score:2)
You may soon get a call from your doctor if you've let your gym membership lapse, made a habit of ordering out for pizza or begin shopping at plus-sized stores.
When was the last time any doctor anywhere made an outgoing call to a patient? I get better customer service from my dog's veterinarian.
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Well, that call is in response to yours. I think jamesl meant a "just thinking about you" type of call.
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Well, that call is in response to yours. I think jamesl meant a "just thinking about you" type of call.
That's because the underlying core of western medicine is a reactive one rather than a proactive one.
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Boutique (read that "private, self-pay") physicians will do that as part of their service. But if you are part of the rank-and-file hitting an outpatient arm of a hospital? I totally agree with you. I work as a interface programmer for all sort of medical systems and can say they are at least _trying_ with the EMR's to give something resembling personal service by sending automated reminders and correspondence to you. But it's still just another form-letter in the end. I mean really - if you knew the realit
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When was the last time any doctor anywhere made an outgoing call to a patient?
When your bill is in arrears.
Since they will check NSA 'passive kill' list (Score:1)
Since they will check the NSA 'passive kill' list anyway, they might as well do the rest, in case you are not the standard auto-die list .. the single man. Even then, they might want to torture you first at NSA so perhaps you'll get health care anyway. Or saved to fill a private jail cell, perhaps.
Anyone up for HIPAA? (Score:3, Interesting)
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Law firms recently received instructions regarding "secondary" violations of HIPAA. For instance, a firm might store X-ray images and depositions, expert affidavits, diagnoses, etc. that are strictly controlled at the source, but not necessarily at law firms, be the form of retention paper or digital. It would seem logical that all parties who have access to, or store, HIPAA-covered information should be regulated the same.
No, it really does not make sense. Take the law firms for example, if you provide your information to a law firm with the intent of suing a hospital or doctor, you are providing it with the intent that it (might) eventually be used in PUBLIC court proceedings. Why should a morass of privacy regulations apply in that situation?
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Data becomes public if and only if it's introduced into evidence by the Law Firm. Is it really so onerous to say, if you have health data that is confidential, take steps so it will not be disclosed until such time as it becomes part of the public record? Otherwise you open the door to all kinds of corner cases where a law firm can effectively disclose this information.
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Data becomes public if and only if it's introduced into evidence by the Law Firm. Is it really so onerous to say, if you have health data that is confidential, take steps so it will not be disclosed until such time as it becomes part of the public record? Otherwise you open the door to all kinds of corner cases where a law firm can effectively disclose this information.
Are you forgetting that your communications with your lawyer were confidential for centuries before HIPAA piled on its god-awful morass of regulations???
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Very valid point.
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Anathetic? (Score:5, Funny)
Is data mining patients done under local or general anesthetic?
Ordering Pizza in the Future (Score:4, Informative)
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1984 (the novel). :)"
When it was written, it was incredible, such an imaginative mind as that man had.
*In* 1984, it was impossible to believe any government (and especially anyone *not* in government) would ever get to know everything about you in such detail. Even in Russia, or Eastern Germany.
In 2014, people laugh "huh, and without even needing Google or Facebook
In 2034 it will have been long overtaken by reality, and all except the old won't even remember that people once used to enjoy something called "
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I would mod you up, but sadly, I have no mod points.
call from your doctor - heh (Score:2)
More like a computer- generated robocall.
Besides, your doctor or hospital would probably prefer that you acquire an expensive long-term health condition that requires a lot of billable and reimbursable outpatient labor. They just don't want to see you walk in the door without private health insurance.
Something I'd like to see (Score:5, Interesting)
It wouldn't cost much to implement, and would be a trove of info. Have a public structure derived from the national healthcare in charge of it which enforces strong anonymity, and provide anonymity data to big data analysts. It wouldn't take long to figure out scandals such as the Mediator. I mean, if you can't take ONE minute to answer some questions that WILL help others, why should you get free health care ?
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Haha, I can't wait until the news stories about the 1/1000000 case where a botched surgery results in death and the family is sent a survey asking 'On a scale of Least Satisfied to Most Satisfied, how would you rate the care you received?'
Depends on whether your relatives like or hate you...
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You have no right to demand a health care provider to provide you their services for free.
Cash Cash Baby (Score:3)
All the more incentive to go back to paper money.
Use debit / credit cards and open yourself to fraud and tracking, use cash and open yourself to robbery.
Either way, we lost the war. The corporations won.
The Public didn't even know there was a war on.
No, no, no.... (Score:1)
Quote: "You may soon get a call from your doctor if you've let your gym membership lapse, made a habit of ordering out for pizza or begin shopping at plus-sized stores...."
What utter idiot wrote that article. Unless your last name is Rockefeller, you're not going to get a call from your doctor over such things. They've got far better things to do with their time. If you get a call, it'd be from some unfortunate person who's being paid little more than minimum wage for the work.
This touches on one of my prim
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No, it's just that a real journalist would have so much to put in a story that corporations that run all the major news outlets don't want the public to know, so they only allow the stories they want told, with the spin they want on it.
Pfffft, preventative care doesn't pay (Score:1)
While the theory of preventative care is great for marketing and selling the privacy intrusion to legislators, it has a negative impact on the bottom line. Ultimately the data is far more valuable to an insurance company than a healthcare provider.
Don't expect a call from your doctor, only an insurance rate increase notice in the mail.
HIPPA? (Score:2)
It certainly would seem to be a violation of HIPPA for a hospital to be giving your information out to others without your consent. Now, if the hospital is using the data collection services and doing their own comparison, cross-referencing your medical history with your collected behaviors, that might be different. It is likely, that is not what is being done, or proposed, however.
In reality, it is also unlikely that the hospital will have enough data about you. Your insurance company would be a different
Cash! (Score:2)
"...made a habit of ordering out for pizza..."
Pay cash. Stop at Little Caesars. Done!
I'm just waiting.. (Score:2)
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I've tried to have a reasonable discussion on this topic with many people who are of the mindset you describe.
It always devolves into a "think of the children" tack, where people that are ok with omnipresent monitoring argue that we can't have a safe society unless everything is tracked, which of course is utter bullshit.
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Another benefit is using cash... (Score:3)
Things like grocery shopping, clothing, Home Depot, going to the bar, etc...
I initially started doing it because of how porous and UN-trustworthy the whole paradigm of card transactions is.
This article hits home on how using cash helps me in another way, being that my purchases can't be tracked.
You know it really is interesting seeing how (for lack of a better phrase) Orwellian the whole system is getting.
Interesting, as in Hindenburg appointing Hitler Chancellor in 1933...
So how do they get it? (Score:2)
Either the hospital goes to the company and says "here's a list of every patient we have, tell us everything you have", or the company brings it to them.
Telling the companies your patient list might be a violation of HIPAA.
If the company comes up the hospital and says "we have data on the following patients you have, want to buy it?", that's also a little shady.
If the hospital just buys data on everybody and sifts out the people they're interested in, well, that's downright creepy.
I just don't see how you c
The real reason for this (Score:2)
I would hope so (Score:2)
Hospitals are required to submit data to health departments for public health reasons. This data is sent by requirement of law.
Sending it to a marketing third party is a big no-no due to HIPPA
I'm totally fine with that (Score:2)
Sounds great - after all, it's to server me better! I'll just go ahead and assume that insurance companies have no interest at all in finding ways to charge me more money while adding to the list of pre-existing conditions they don't have to cover.