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It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy

It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy and trust. The lack of accountability and transparency from these corporations is mind-boggling. When patients opt-out or decline their consent, it should be respected and protected, not used as a loophole for companies to continue sharing their sensitive information. But corporations typically do not police themselves up, so more importantly, healthcare providers must be held to a much higher standard. In my mind, it is hard to imagine a patient opting-in and asking to receive targeted advertisement based on their medical condition. Should advertising based on sensitive medical data even be legally allowed? It's high time that the FTC step up and enforce stricter regulations on the sharing of sensitive medical data. Patients deserve better.

wahnfrieden 4y ago
It’s the profit motive.
chankstein38 4y ago
The amount of big pharma ads on TV and radio is obnoxious. You basically can't consume mass media without seeing 5 ads every 10 minutes for medications. It's insane. I'm with you we need this to stop.
- lp0_on_fire 4y ago
  It's definitely a problem with pharma but in general advertising is getting worse and worse. Our brains were not designed to be under _constant_ psychological assault designed to trick us into buying things we don't want or need. Advertising and marketing have been refined as a science in the past 100 years to such a degree that many times you don't even know you're being subjected to it.
  - NoZebra120vClip 4y ago
    You know what I think? I think it's trained my brain to disbelieve and be skeptical of basically everything I hear, and I think it's also trained me to instinctively say "no" and refuse things that I am offered. Now it is healthy to have skepticism when strangers tell me a whopper, or when I'm offered something too good to be true. But if I'm in this habit and I refuse to believe trustworthy sources, someone in authority, or I refuse a gift of goodwill from someone who truly has my best interests in mind, that is advertising being detrimental in its training my mind and will.
    - chankstein38 4y ago
      Right? I don't think the point that it shouldn't be happening and something needs done is nullified by this but I'm with you all it's done is made me say "If I firt see it in a commercial, I'm not going to buy it or deal with it because it's likely a scam"
    - smcin 4y ago
      Skepticism is fine, but ads often actually aren't making the claims a casual watch would suggest they are. Unrepresentative testimonials (see small print disclaimers), phony personal experiences, doctors portrayed by actors in white coats (remember "Dr" Victoria Zdrok selling male enhancement pills in 2008; she's a doctor in psychology).
- judge2020 4y ago
  My theory on this is because there are a decreasing amount of people watching broadcast television on-air. As fewer millennials and Gen Z/Zoomers are watching anything live, fewer advertisers are going to see it as a lucrative advertising opportunity, so the only people left still paying big bucks are the pharmaceutical companies, and they get a better deal anyways since a larger percentage of the viewers that see their ad will be >50 and need that medicine.
  - burkaman 4y ago
    I think there's also a much higher return on investment for medications than anything else, since they can overcharge so much. One person starting on an expensive drug could single-handedly pay for an ad that a million people saw.
- smcin 4y ago
  Because the median age of "linear" TV viewers in the US is in the high 50s [0], and of cable news viewers early 60s [1], and of PBS viewers 65. All the kidz have gone to streaming or social media or podcasts [2]. As to the direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) for pharmaceuticals, the US and NZ are the only countries which allow it, it's a terrible idea. So on US TV you get the inevitable intersection of both of those. US pharma spent $6.88b on DTCA in 2021. Congress isn't going to do diddly because it loves insider-trading on non-public information in pharma. Perverse incentives. If you want to avoid the pharma ads, cut the cord or switch to a news source with younger viewer age. I see judge2020 had already written the same thing just below. [0]: https://www.parrotanalytics.com/academy/learn-about-the-value-of-broadcast-tv https://www.parrotanalytics.com/academy/learn-about-the-valu... [1]: https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/heres-the-median-age-of-the-typical-cable-news-viewer/ https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/heres-the-median-age-of-the-... [2]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/717651/most-popular-news-platforms/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/717651/most-popular-news...
- ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  My fave is the old couple in his and hers tubs. This is the version they should broadcast, though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY6HOdG9sTY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY6HOdG9sTY
reaperducer 4y ago
It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy and trust. In my experience, and based on the article, it sounds like Phreesia is an outlier. As someone who works for a large healthcare company, we're scared shitless company-wide about the potential for personal data to get outside our hands. We have an entire department of people just to constantly watch everything that is done — every process, every piece of hardware, every piece of software, everything — to make sure that personal data doesn't go where it doesn't belong. Every employee down to the janitors has training about this at least once a year. Last year there was a minor data breach. Someone left a small stack of eight forms with people's PII on them on a desk in a conference room unattended for a few hours. It was an all-hands-on-deck five-alarm fire. It wasn't in my department, so I don't know what the result was or if any employees were disciplined. But seemingly every time another healthcare company gets fined for violating HIPAA, we get a company-wide memo about it as a reminder. I haven't heard of Phreesia before now. It sounds like one of those scummy companies that sells cheap "office solutions" to small companies (in this case doctors offices) that don't have the resources to do things right and in-house. People should complain to the proper authorities about Phreesia, or any other company that acts this way. HIPAA complaints are taken very seriously in the United States. Your doctor's office may act like it doesn't care, but the feds do, and then the doctor's insurance company sure as hell does. One way or another, the lazy/greedy/cheap doctor will pay. But you have to document, and report, not just moan anonymously online. That does nothing. Document and report. Don't let the companies get away with it, or they will keep getting away with it.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  There’s a big compliance pain in the ass, and you’re training janitors about stuff they probably don’t need to know. But you’re probably sending faxes to providers, and while I’m sure your company does a good job with controls, there’s no doubt a firehose of “anonymized” marketable data going out the door.
  - reaperducer 4y ago
    There’s a big compliance pain in the ass, and you’re training janitors about stuff they probably don’t need to know. I can tell that you don't work in healthcare, or with janitors, or you'd know that they need to know most of this stuff. It's the janitors that have the keys to everything. It's the janitors that know which bins go to the sanitation department and which ones go to the secure shredding company. It's the janitors who walk around the building at night and notice if someone's left papers on their desk after they went home (another one of those four-alarm-fire events), or a computer didn't lock itself, or someone dropped an access badge, or something else is amiss that could cause problems. there’s no doubt a firehose of “anonymized” marketable data going out the door. Please specify how it is that "there's no doubt." Do you have some evidence, or are you just being a cynic because that's the way anonymous wannabe cool kids act on the internet? If you have evidence let me know, and I'll hook you up with our department that handles this sort of thing so they can take a look at it.
DoingIsLearning 4y ago
> Should advertising based on sensitive medical data even be legally allowed? In most other markets, you are not even allowed to advertise medication (that requires perscription) to patients, so that point is moot. Pharma advertisement is a byproduct of a privatized healthcare and the paradigm of the 'customer' patient.
teddyh 4y ago
> It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy and trust. One is a profit center, one is a cost center.

wahnfrieden 4y ago

It’s the profit motive.

chankstein38 4y ago

The amount of big pharma ads on TV and radio is obnoxious. You basically can't consume mass media without seeing 5 ads every 10 minutes for medications. It's insane. I'm with you we need this to stop.

lp0_on_fire 4y ago
It's definitely a problem with pharma but in general advertising is getting worse and worse. Our brains were not designed to be under _constant_ psychological assault designed to trick us into buying things we don't want or need. Advertising and marketing have been refined as a science in the past 100 years to such a degree that many times you don't even know you're being subjected to it.
- NoZebra120vClip 4y ago
  You know what I think? I think it's trained my brain to disbelieve and be skeptical of basically everything I hear, and I think it's also trained me to instinctively say "no" and refuse things that I am offered. Now it is healthy to have skepticism when strangers tell me a whopper, or when I'm offered something too good to be true. But if I'm in this habit and I refuse to believe trustworthy sources, someone in authority, or I refuse a gift of goodwill from someone who truly has my best interests in mind, that is advertising being detrimental in its training my mind and will.
  - chankstein38 4y ago
    Right? I don't think the point that it shouldn't be happening and something needs done is nullified by this but I'm with you all it's done is made me say "If I firt see it in a commercial, I'm not going to buy it or deal with it because it's likely a scam"
  - smcin 4y ago
    Skepticism is fine, but ads often actually aren't making the claims a casual watch would suggest they are. Unrepresentative testimonials (see small print disclaimers), phony personal experiences, doctors portrayed by actors in white coats (remember "Dr" Victoria Zdrok selling male enhancement pills in 2008; she's a doctor in psychology).
judge2020 4y ago
My theory on this is because there are a decreasing amount of people watching broadcast television on-air. As fewer millennials and Gen Z/Zoomers are watching anything live, fewer advertisers are going to see it as a lucrative advertising opportunity, so the only people left still paying big bucks are the pharmaceutical companies, and they get a better deal anyways since a larger percentage of the viewers that see their ad will be >50 and need that medicine.
- burkaman 4y ago
  I think there's also a much higher return on investment for medications than anything else, since they can overcharge so much. One person starting on an expensive drug could single-handedly pay for an ad that a million people saw.
smcin 4y ago
Because the median age of "linear" TV viewers in the US is in the high 50s [0], and of cable news viewers early 60s [1], and of PBS viewers 65. All the kidz have gone to streaming or social media or podcasts [2]. As to the direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) for pharmaceuticals, the US and NZ are the only countries which allow it, it's a terrible idea. So on US TV you get the inevitable intersection of both of those. US pharma spent $6.88b on DTCA in 2021. Congress isn't going to do diddly because it loves insider-trading on non-public information in pharma. Perverse incentives. If you want to avoid the pharma ads, cut the cord or switch to a news source with younger viewer age. I see judge2020 had already written the same thing just below. [0]: https://www.parrotanalytics.com/academy/learn-about-the-value-of-broadcast-tv https://www.parrotanalytics.com/academy/learn-about-the-valu... [1]: https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/heres-the-median-age-of-the-typical-cable-news-viewer/ https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/heres-the-median-age-of-the-... [2]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/717651/most-popular-news-platforms/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/717651/most-popular-news...
ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
My fave is the old couple in his and hers tubs. This is the version they should broadcast, though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY6HOdG9sTY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY6HOdG9sTY

reaperducer 4y ago

It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy and trust. In my experience, and based on the article, it sounds like Phreesia is an outlier. As someone who works for a large healthcare company, we're scared shitless company-wide about the potential for personal data to get outside our hands. We have an entire department of people just to constantly watch everything that is done — every process, every piece of hardware, every piece of software, everything — to make sure that personal data doesn't go where it doesn't belong. Every employee down to the janitors has training about this at least once a year. Last year there was a minor data breach. Someone left a small stack of eight forms with people's PII on them on a desk in a conference room unattended for a few hours. It was an all-hands-on-deck five-alarm fire. It wasn't in my department, so I don't know what the result was or if any employees were disciplined. But seemingly every time another healthcare company gets fined for violating HIPAA, we get a company-wide memo about it as a reminder. I haven't heard of Phreesia before now. It sounds like one of those scummy companies that sells cheap "office solutions" to small companies (in this case doctors offices) that don't have the resources to do things right and in-house. People should complain to the proper authorities about Phreesia, or any other company that acts this way. HIPAA complaints are taken very seriously in the United States. Your doctor's office may act like it doesn't care, but the feds do, and then the doctor's insurance company sure as hell does. One way or another, the lazy/greedy/cheap doctor will pay. But you have to document, and report, not just moan anonymously online. That does nothing. Document and report. Don't let the companies get away with it, or they will keep getting away with it.

Spooky23 4y ago
There’s a big compliance pain in the ass, and you’re training janitors about stuff they probably don’t need to know. But you’re probably sending faxes to providers, and while I’m sure your company does a good job with controls, there’s no doubt a firehose of “anonymized” marketable data going out the door.
- reaperducer 4y ago
  There’s a big compliance pain in the ass, and you’re training janitors about stuff they probably don’t need to know. I can tell that you don't work in healthcare, or with janitors, or you'd know that they need to know most of this stuff. It's the janitors that have the keys to everything. It's the janitors that know which bins go to the sanitation department and which ones go to the secure shredding company. It's the janitors who walk around the building at night and notice if someone's left papers on their desk after they went home (another one of those four-alarm-fire events), or a computer didn't lock itself, or someone dropped an access badge, or something else is amiss that could cause problems. there’s no doubt a firehose of “anonymized” marketable data going out the door. Please specify how it is that "there's no doubt." Do you have some evidence, or are you just being a cynic because that's the way anonymous wannabe cool kids act on the internet? If you have evidence let me know, and I'll hook you up with our department that handles this sort of thing so they can take a look at it.

DoingIsLearning 4y ago

> Should advertising based on sensitive medical data even be legally allowed? In most other markets, you are not even allowed to advertise medication (that requires perscription) to patients, so that point is moot. Pharma advertisement is a byproduct of a privatized healthcare and the paradigm of the 'customer' patient.

teddyh 4y ago

> It's disheartening to see that these large healthcare corporations are more interested in mining patient data for advertising than prioritizing patient privacy and trust. One is a profit center, one is a cost center.