Health records are already less private than most people think.
And despite new federal regulations that were finalized April 14, it s unclear whether converting them to electronic form will make them more safe or less. We have decided we want public health, so we allow people to be tracked down and treated. We have decided we want research, and researchers need access to records. On average, the paper record of a single medical encounter a checkup, for example, or a visit to a specialist makes 17 stops in the health care system, from the physician, lab staff and pharmacy personnel, to health and life insurance managers, researchers, state vital statistics bureaus and more, according to an analysis presented at a meeting on health privacy last month in Washington. At each stop, someone reviews the information in the record for instance, to prepare a prescription, authorize a payment or double-check a hospital s record keeping.