Securing Your Test Results.

How do you get your test results from your Gynecologist? This is an interesting dilemma for the doctor and the patient. Until recently there was absolutely no good solution. 

Did your doctor leave your results on your answering machine? What if your doctor, or the nurse in the office,  said, on the answering machine, that your herpes testing was negative? Obviously your children, your nosy neighbor who was in your Kitchen for tea, and your spouse could hear that message. Their first obvious thought would be, "why does this person need herpes testing?". Or maybe, your doctor said, on the answering machine, "call me for an important result."  And then when you got the message on the answering machine, the doctor was overseas for a week leaving you in dire stress due to the unknown results. Or, maybe your doctor sent you a letter with the results. But, the letter got lost. Or, maybe your spouse opened the letter to find that your herpes testing was negative, or your pregnancy test was positive. Or your cancer test was suspicious and needed further testing. Since the doctor has no way of knowing if you got the letter, the doctor will just file the chart away. This might leave you with undiagnosed cancer. Don't get me wrong, that would be poor office procedure, but it does happen. 

As a physician, these problems are nearly insurmountable, especially if the doctor is caring enough to not leave you in dire stress. So we wind up making tons of phone calls. And we find that fewer and fewer people actually answer the phone anymore. This leads to the scary "call me" messages on the answering machine. 

All of these problems are untenable, and have no good solution at all. We just muddle through with a bunch of phone calls, using discretion when necessary, trying to honor patients requests for brutal honesty on the answering machine, and keep a giant pile of results pending delivery. Usually, results are delayed until the patient happens to call back when the doctor is available. Or, ultimately, we send certified letters so that we know the patient got the results. (for the non USA folks reading this, the definition of a certified letter is one in which the letter carrier gets a signature from the recipient on a sheet that certifies delivery. So then the doctor can breath easy because there is written documentation that the results have been delivered. 

How do we solve this problem? There is a new technical solution that seems to solve all of these problems at once. And this solution allows the doctor to get the message out in a very secure and private manner. And one more thing: This solution allows the doctor to be completely open and frank with the patient in a manner that absolutely no one else can hear. 

This solution is a web service called "Secure Reach". You can Google it. 

This solution is not cheap, but it is so much better than all of the other alternatives that it literally changes the efficiency of the practice. And allows people to get their results in a real hurry. 

What I will do with results is, I speak into a secure, password protected, voice mail box. The patient is the only one that can access the mail box, unless they have chosen to share their password with someone. Such sharing should be frowned upon in the modern world. Passwords should be kept completely private. Even from spouses. 

Anyway, no one can hear these results but the intended recipient, if the recipient chooses to keep it private. The recipient can find a quiet place and hear the message privately, on the phone.  Since it is securely private, I can pretty much say anything that is necessary to say. 

This solution satisfies HIPAA compliance. HIPAA is a gigantic health care privacy bill. When it first came out it was so over-interpreted that physicians could not call people by their first name anywhere in the office. This particular over-interpretation has since been rescinded. 

And it makes my life easier. For instance, I just got home from the hospital after delivering a baby. It is 11 pm. There is no chance that I am going to call people at home. But, I can leave messages for them on the Secure Reach Messaging System. They will then get a secure message tomorrow. No one can hear  it but them, and no one can read their mail. 

This system is a great solution to the problems outlined above. 

Thanks for reading, 

Sincerely, 

Doctor John Marcus 

89 North Maple Ave

Ridgewood, NJ, 07450