5 ms·

Perhaps Facebook should also scoop up my medical records, so drug companies can improve the way they advertise to me. I'm sure all those posts about my beer re

by swalsh 8y ago

Perhaps Facebook should also scoop up my medical records, so drug companies can improve the way they advertise to me. I'm sure all those posts about my beer reviews will help my doctor diagnosis my chronic gout. Seems like a 2-sided deal. /sarcasm

cityzen 8y ago
gout is amazing, isn't it?
ribble 8y ago
news has been out about facebook seeking access to medical records for a while now https://www.grahamcluley.com/facebooks-secret-plan-to-access-hospital-patient-records/ https://www.grahamcluley.com/facebooks-secret-plan-to-access...
Spooky23 8y ago
They already do. My wife had a very early ruptured ectopic pregnancy (which she wasn't aware of), which nearly killed her. On the week that the baby would have been born, Enfamil launched an acquisition campaign targeted at expectant mothers that month, kicked off by a Fedex package containing bottled/powered formula (worth about $60) and including Facebook campaign targeting new mothers. This was very upsetting to us, so I dug in, found out from the company where they obtained out information, and obtained the list. I spoke to a couple of physician and nurse friends who are pretty confident that it was a combination of the ER admission, an imaging claim, and a drug that was prescribed and filled in the hospital that made it highly likely to an observer that she was pregnant -- but didn't provide enough detail to determine that she left the hospital not pregnant. It turns out that information regarding hospital admission, insurance claims and prescription fulfillment is available and slurped up by various parties, who are able to de-anonymize it. It contained alot of information, including accurate salary history, cars we owned, approximate credit score, where we bought baby stuff for our previous child, etc. I make it a point to share this whenever appropriate, as it was a very painful violation of our privacy, and really threw me for a loop, as I couldn't fathom that our medical providers were selling our data to help pitch diapers and formula. Facebook and many other companies either has access to this information by buying lists, or can extrapolate by looking at advertiser patterns.
- creaghpatr 8y ago
  >I spoke to a couple of physician and nurse friends who are pretty confident that it was a combination of the ER admission, an imaging claim, and a drug that was prescribed and filled in the hospital that made it highly likely to an observer that she was pregnant -- but didn't provide enough detail to determine that she left the hospital not pregnant. That would be a very serious breach of HIPAA.....and wow turns out I am wrong, after a quick google search, I'm now afraid you may be right- that they did not de-anonymize you but somehow botched a targeted anonymous profile. Absolutely bonkers. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-data-brokers-make-money-off-your-medical-records/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-data-brokers-...
  - Spooky23 8y ago
    Physician data is not anonymized, so correlation is pretty easy. With drugs, physicians are treated like sales representatives by the pharmaceutical companies, who get real-time data from the pharmacies about prescriptions as they are filled. They are assigned quotas based on demographics and "education" or other programs are targeted based on how they prescribe. I was less successful in learning exactly what information was shared re: the medical treatment, but because my employer administers hospital coverage separately from physician billing, we believe that only hospital related claims were used. The folks who I spoke to theorized that if I used an HMO, the anesthesia would have lowered my wife's "score" for further marketing. The hospital network is good at not answering questions and I've gotten very little from them over 3 years -- I'm now thinking about lobbying a state legislator(s) about it. They also have information about the doctors that allows them to tailor the marketing message. This might be a good place to start learning more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2517975/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2517975/
    - kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
      You could conceivably sue all involved parties for libel from passing around lies about your wife's medical status. Probably easy to add in some HIPPA violations too. That's why the hospital isn't going to be forthcoming because they know they're on shaky ground.
eanzenberg 8y ago
Google is doing this in the name of research.

by swalsh 8y ago

cityzen 8y ago

gout is amazing, isn't it?

ribble 8y ago

news has been out about facebook seeking access to medical records for a while now https://www.grahamcluley.com/facebooks-secret-plan-to-access-hospital-patient-records/ https://www.grahamcluley.com/facebooks-secret-plan-to-access...

Spooky23 8y ago

They already do. My wife had a very early ruptured ectopic pregnancy (which she wasn't aware of), which nearly killed her. On the week that the baby would have been born, Enfamil launched an acquisition campaign targeted at expectant mothers that month, kicked off by a Fedex package containing bottled/powered formula (worth about $60) and including Facebook campaign targeting new mothers. This was very upsetting to us, so I dug in, found out from the company where they obtained out information, and obtained the list. I spoke to a couple of physician and nurse friends who are pretty confident that it was a combination of the ER admission, an imaging claim, and a drug that was prescribed and filled in the hospital that made it highly likely to an observer that she was pregnant -- but didn't provide enough detail to determine that she left the hospital not pregnant. It turns out that information regarding hospital admission, insurance claims and prescription fulfillment is available and slurped up by various parties, who are able to de-anonymize it. It contained alot of information, including accurate salary history, cars we owned, approximate credit score, where we bought baby stuff for our previous child, etc. I make it a point to share this whenever appropriate, as it was a very painful violation of our privacy, and really threw me for a loop, as I couldn't fathom that our medical providers were selling our data to help pitch diapers and formula. Facebook and many other companies either has access to this information by buying lists, or can extrapolate by looking at advertiser patterns.

creaghpatr 8y ago
>I spoke to a couple of physician and nurse friends who are pretty confident that it was a combination of the ER admission, an imaging claim, and a drug that was prescribed and filled in the hospital that made it highly likely to an observer that she was pregnant -- but didn't provide enough detail to determine that she left the hospital not pregnant. That would be a very serious breach of HIPAA.....and wow turns out I am wrong, after a quick google search, I'm now afraid you may be right- that they did not de-anonymize you but somehow botched a targeted anonymous profile. Absolutely bonkers. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-data-brokers-make-money-off-your-medical-records/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-data-brokers-...
- Spooky23 8y ago
  Physician data is not anonymized, so correlation is pretty easy. With drugs, physicians are treated like sales representatives by the pharmaceutical companies, who get real-time data from the pharmacies about prescriptions as they are filled. They are assigned quotas based on demographics and "education" or other programs are targeted based on how they prescribe. I was less successful in learning exactly what information was shared re: the medical treatment, but because my employer administers hospital coverage separately from physician billing, we believe that only hospital related claims were used. The folks who I spoke to theorized that if I used an HMO, the anesthesia would have lowered my wife's "score" for further marketing. The hospital network is good at not answering questions and I've gotten very little from them over 3 years -- I'm now thinking about lobbying a state legislator(s) about it. They also have information about the doctors that allows them to tailor the marketing message. This might be a good place to start learning more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2517975/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2517975/
  - kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
    You could conceivably sue all involved parties for libel from passing around lies about your wife's medical status. Probably easy to add in some HIPPA violations too. That's why the hospital isn't going to be forthcoming because they know they're on shaky ground.

eanzenberg 8y ago

Google is doing this in the name of research.