Ninety-five percent of surveyed patients worry that their medical records will be leaked in a data breach, according to a study from Health Gorilla, a health information network and interoperability provider.
The study surveyed over 1,200 patients from May 2022 to May 2023 to observe their perspective on the security of sharing their medical records with health systems, according to a July 11 news release.
Here are some things to know, according to Health Gorilla's "State of Patient Privacy" report:
- Only 5 percent of patients expressed no concern over the possibility of their personal information being involved in a data breach. Ninety-five percent reported having extreme, moderate or slight concern.
- Patients trust the government facilitating health data exchange over big tech companies. Sixty-five percent of patients reported a distrust in big companies, such as Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook and Microsoft, having access to their health data. Only 14 percent of patients who trust these companies reported having "full trust," while the other 21 percent described their attitude as having only "slight trust." Meanwhile, 60 percent of patients would be less concerned if the government facilitated their health data exchange.
- The majority of patients are only comfortable sharing health data when used for treatment. Seventy-one percent of surveyed patients reported they are comfortable sharing their health data when it is used for treatment purposes. Thirty-nine percent are comfortable sharing data with insurance companies for payment purposes, 28 percent for operations, 23 percent for public health and 13 percent are not comfortable sharing health data at all.