Cardinal Health joins US Dossia project to develop online personal
health records for employees
19 February 2007 Dublin, Ohio. Cardinal Health has become the sixth
member of the Dossia Founders Group, an organization funding the non-profit
Omnimedix Institute to develop Dossia, a Web-based framework through which
US employees, dependents and retirees can maintain lifelong personal health
records. Cardinal Health is the first healthcare company to join Dossia,
which was first announced in Washington, DC in December 2006. Fellow Dossia
Founders Group members include Applied Materials, BP America, Inc., Intel
Corporation, Pitney Bowes, Inc. and Wal-Mart.
"Cardinal Health looks forward to sharing our healthcare industry
expertise to support the development of this innovative health records
system," said R. Kerry Clark, chairman and CEO of Cardinal Health. "We've
long encouraged employees to take an active role in managing their health
care and believe that empowering consumers with this resource will lead to
improved health-care quality, efficiency and better patient outcomes." The
Omnimedix Institute is the non-profit organization responsible for
developing Dossia, the Web-based infrastructure which will empower
individuals to manage their own healthcare records and maintain
comprehensive, up-to-date histories for themselves and their families, in a
secure and private environment. The system seeks to improve population
health by facilitating preventative health measures and improving consumer
communication with healthcare professionals. Ultimately, the system also
aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the US health-care
system, reducing waste and duplication of effort for consumers and
providers. At the request of each participating employee, the Dossia
framework will gather health information on behalf of the individual from
various sources and store it within secured databases. Health records will
be secure and private, accessible only by the individual or by others to
whom they have granted permission. Employees will choose whether or not to
participate, and those who do opt-in will choose how much of their personal
data is shared, with whom and in what form. Records will also be portable,
even when employees change employers, health plans or doctors. Dossia has
received the support of key health-care industry and consumer groups
including the American Association of Family Physicians (AAFP), American
Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Council on Clinical Information Technology, The
National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention and the National Consumers League. The more than 2.5 million
U.S. employees, dependents and retirees of Cardinal Health and fellow
members of the Dossia Founders Group will receive initial access to Dossia
upon its launch, which is targeted for mid-2007. The system will soon be
made available to other communities of users and personal health
applications developers. To top
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