Personal Health Records

Patients have direct control over their records. In most countries, a person's vaccination history is treated as a personal health record where the individual patient (or their guardian) has physical control over the vaccination record. This document may be required for entry into school, international travel, etc.

Even in industrialized countries, paper remains the lowest common denominator for records given to patients. Some examples do exist where companies act on behalf of the patient to hold electronic versions of their medical records, much in the way that a bank holds an individual's financial records. Microsoft's Health Vault and Google Health are just the latest entries into the space. See FollowMe.com and MiVia for real life examples in use today that address the needs of underserved populations.

Conditions for success

Electronic PHR systems require a certain level of infrastructure available within the community. Two basic approaches:

1. Patient controls the storage device and needs a local reader (e.g. smart cards)
2. Online storage on behalf of the patient and the patient needs a access to a device connected to the network (internet terminal or mobile phone)

SharedRecords provides a lowest common denominator that can work regardless of the infrastructure available.