Emily L. Evans, PhD, MPH and Danielle Whicher, PhD, MHS
Clinical decision support systems leverage data generated in the course of standard clinical care to improve clinical practice. They need to ensure privacy and quality of patients’ data, but must also allow queries of electronic health records.
Cynthia E. Schairer, PhD, Caryn Kseniya Rubanovich, MS, and Cinnamon S. Bloss, PhD
Questions about data privacy need to be addressed when research institutions negotiate with companies developing mobile health applications. Commercial terms of use and data sharing notifications should be reviewed before use in human subject research settings.
Social and behavioral data contained in electronic health records are essential for studying health disparities. Can researchers avoid bias when collecting, analyzing, and using such data?
An emerging medical ethics issue is whether to delay posting pathology reports to electronic health records (EHR) to allow clinicians time to follow up.
Volk v DeMeerleer may conflict with professional guidelines regarding physicians’ obligations to breach patient confidentiality to protect third parties.
Some commentators say comparative trials of FDA-approved drugs are overburdened by current Common Rule regulations and that researchers should not be required to obtain explicit consent for participation in the most innocuous of these trials.