Our Bodies, Our Data

Our Bodies, Our Data
Author :
Publisher : Beacon Press
Total Pages : 226
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780807033340
ISBN-13 : 0807033340
Rating : 4/5 (340 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Our Bodies, Our Data by : Adam Tanner

Download or read book Our Bodies, Our Data written by Adam Tanner and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2017-01-10 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the hidden trade in our sensitive medical information became a multibillion-dollar business, but has done little to improve our health-care outcomes Hidden to consumers, patient medical data has become a multibillion-dollar worldwide trade industry between our health-care providers, drug companies, and a complex web of middlemen. This great medical-data bazaar sells copies of the prescription you recently filled, your hospital records, insurance claims, blood-test results, and more, stripped of your name but possibly with identifiers such as year of birth, gender, and doctor. As computing grows ever more sophisticated, patient dossiers become increasingly vulnerable to reidentification and the possibility of being targeted by identity thieves or hackers. Paradoxically, comprehensive electronic files for patient treatment—the reason medical data exists in the first place—remain an elusive goal. Even today, patients or their doctors rarely have easy access to comprehensive records that could improve care. In the evolution of medical data, the instinct for profit has outstripped patient needs. This book tells the human, behind-the-scenes story of how such a system evolved internationally. It begins with New York advertising man Ludwig Wolfgang Frohlich, who founded IMS Health, the world’s dominant health-data miner, in the 1950s. IMS Health now gathers patient medical data from more than 45 billion transactions annually from 780,000 data feeds in more than 100 countries. Our Bodies, Our Data uncovers some of Frohlich’s hidden past and follows the story of what happened in the following decades. This is both a story about medicine and medical practice, and about big business and maximizing profits, and the places these meet, places most patients would like to believe are off-limits. Our Bodies, Our Data seeks to spark debate on how we can best balance the promise big data offers to advance medicine and improve lives while preserving the rights and interests of every patient. We, the public, deserve a say in this discussion. After all, it’s our data.


Our Bodies, Our Data Related Books

Our Bodies, Our Data
Language: en
Pages: 226
Authors: Adam Tanner
Categories: Medical
Type: BOOK - Published: 2017-01-10 - Publisher: Beacon Press

GET EBOOK

How the hidden trade in our sensitive medical information became a multibillion-dollar business, but has done little to improve our health-care outcomes Hidden
Giving Bodies Back to Data
Language: en
Pages: 321
Authors: Silvia Casini
Categories: Technology & Engineering
Type: BOOK - Published: 2021-08-03 - Publisher: MIT Press

GET EBOOK

An examination of the bodily, situated aspects of data-visualization work, looking at visualization practices around the development of MRI technology. Our bodi
Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century
Language: en
Pages: 0
Authors: Boston Women's Health Book Collective
Categories: Women
Type: BOOK - Published: 1998 - Publisher: Turtleback Books

GET EBOOK

The definitive consumer health reference for women of all ages and ethnic groups, this book encompasses such controversial issues as managed care and the insura
Data Smog
Language: en
Pages: 337
Authors: David Shenk
Categories: Computers
Type: BOOK - Published: 2009-10-13 - Publisher: Harper Collins

GET EBOOK

Media scholar ( and Internet Enthusiast ) David Shenk examines the troubling effects of information proliferation on our bodies, our brains, our relationships,
Data Breaches
Language: en
Pages: 552
Authors: Sherri Davidoff
Categories: Business & Economics
Type: BOOK - Published: 2019-10-08 - Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional

GET EBOOK

Protect Your Organization Against Massive Data Breaches and Their Consequences Data breaches can be catastrophic, but they remain mysterious because victims don