Medical File Sharing Technologies Advancing

WASHINGTON, DC-A new non-profit group is trying to help network American physicians and hospitals to provide national medical file sharing abilities.

Officials from the Patient Safety Institute say networking patient medical files would decrease medical errors and limit the amount of money spent annually researching previous prescriptions and treatments patients have had.

Instead, organization officials say, money should be pent on establishing communication between doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies. Patients would have the choice of making their medical records available to specific healthcare providers.

The organization plans on begin building a pilot version of the network next year. The group receives funding from companies specializing in communication technologies.

An ultimate goal would be to expand the database to where researchers could use the information to further study pharmaceuticals and conditions without have to coordinate test groups. Patient's identities would be kept private, while their medical records could be used to examine larger health trends.

Information from www.arizonarepublic.com