Patient directed system and method for managing medical information

• US 20030140044A1
• Filed: 05/31/2002
• Published: 07/24/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 01/18/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Peoplechart Corporation
• Original Assignee: Peoplechart Corporation
• Inventors: Holvey, R. David, Mok, Megan Wai-Han, Jopling, Arthur Douglas, Mattox, Joel D.
• Granted Patent: US 7,647,320 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/10
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 10/60 for patient-specific data, e.g. for electronic patient records
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 30/20 for handling medical images, e.g. DICOM, HL7 or PACS

Abstract

A system and method is provided for the management of a patient'"'"'s medical records by a central data repository under the direction of the patient and enabled by an entity managing records on behalf of the patient. Medical records from a plurality of the patient'"'"'s healthcare providers, including past and present healthcare providers, are maintained in this central repository in a way that provides a centralized, comprehensive, and accessible medical history of the patient, as well as a comprehensive organizational structure across all records. An embodiment has the patient directed central repository as the hub in a hub-and-spoke arrangement, where each spoke goes to one of the patient'"'"'s healthcare providers, both past and present. The patient'"'"'s medical records are collected from all the patient'"'"'s healthcare providers, then classified, stored, and organized for use by the patient, healthcare providers, and any other authorized individuals. The records in the repository can be sorted and/or selected in several different ways and displayed to the patient or to his designated medical care providers, and to certain patient designated third parties.

Claims

1. A method for managing a patient'"'"'s medical records authored by a plurality of healthcare providers, wherein at least two healthcare providers of said plurality have different medical records systems, said method comprising:

categorizing a plurality of documents of said patient'"'"'s medical records according to a categorization system;

storing in a central storage area said categorized plurality of documents, wherein access to said central storage area must be authorized by said patient; and

retrieving an ordered set of documents of said categorized plurality of documents, using at least one of a plurality of predetermined criteria.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein said central storage area comprises a database.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein said plurality of predetermined criteria include sorting said categorized plurality of documents in reverse chronological order of creation dates, by medical sub-category, by author, by author specialization, in numerical order of document ID, by document provider, or any combination thereof.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

sorting said plurality of documents; and

presenting said sorted plurality of documents based on a selection criterion and a prioritization algorithm.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising displaying said ordered set of documents to a current healthcare provider examining said patient.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein said displaying said ordered set of documents to a current healthcare provider occurs only for documents in said ordered set which are not marked private by said patient.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein said categorization system is the same for all healthcare providers of said plurality of healthcare providers.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein said categorization system comprises a plurality of categories, said categories comprising a document identifier.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein said categories further comprise:

an author of a page, a specialization of said author, a date said page was created, a page type, a record source, or a name of a file provider.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein said plurality of documents comprises scanned paper-based pages of said patient'"'"'s medical records.

11. A method for a patient accessing said patient'"'"'s medical records originating from a plurality of healthcare providers, wherein at least two healthcare providers of said plurality have different medical records systems, said method comprising:

collecting from said plurality of healthcare providers a plurality of documents of said patient'"'"'s medical records, wherein said plurality of healthcare providers comprise a past and a present health care provider of said patient;

categorizing said plurality of documents according to a categorization system, having more than two categories;

storing in a storage area of a central computer storage said categorized plurality of documents, wherein said storage area is under control of said patient; and

retrieving a document of said stored categorized plurality of documents according to at least one of a plurality of selection criteria, said plurality of selection criteria based on said categorization system.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising displaying said retrieved document to said patient.

13. The method of claim 11 further comprising displaying said retrieved document to a third party after approval by said patient or said patient'"'"'s legal surrogate.

14. The method of claim 11 further comprising displaying said retrieved document to said patient, but not to said patient'"'"'s legal surrogate.

15. The method of claim 11 further comprising distributing said retrieved document by fax, email, or hard copy.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein said hard copy comprises a floppy disk, CD, microfiche, or paper copy.

17. The method of claim 11 wherein said one selection criterion selects documents of said stored categorized plurality of documents with document dates within the previous N months starting with said patient'"'"'s most recent date of activity or a minimum of M documents, whichever results in more documents.

18. The method of claim 17 wherein N=12 and M=3.

19. The method of claim 11 wherein said categorization system is the same for all healthcare providers of said plurality of healthcare providers.

20. The method of claim 11 further comprising displaying a document log of said categorized plurality of documents to said patient.

21. The method of claim 20 wherein said document log is organized by document date, page type, or doctor specialty.

22. The method of claim 11 wherein said selection criteria selects documents in a category selected from a group of categories consisting of:

Medications &

Allergies, Immunizations, Patient Intake Apps, Physical Exams, Progress Notes, Consultations, Operative Notes, ER Reports, Hospital Summaries, EKGs, Imaging Reports, Special Tests, Labs &

Cultures, Therapy Notes, Billing &

Insurance, and Other.

23. The method of claim 11 wherein said selection criteria selects documents in a category selected from a group of categories consisting of:

Medications &

Allergies, Immunizations, Physical Exams, Progress Notes, Consultations, Operative Notes, ER Reports, Hospital Summaries, EKGs, Imaging Reports, Special Tests, Labs &

Cultures, Therapy Notes, and Patient Added Pages.

24. The method of claim 11 wherein said categorization system comprises a plurality of categories, said plurality of categories comprising:

document ID, page type, author of said document, specialization of said author, provider of the record, and date of said document.

25. The method of claim 24 wherein said selection criteria selects documents in a category of said plurality of categories.

26. The method of claim 11 further comprising, when needed, converting to electronic format each document of said patient'"'"'s medical records.

27. The method of claim 11 further comprising, providing to said patient a Combined Medical Records (CMR) report, said CMR report comprising said categorized documents organized by sections, said sections comprising a clinical pages section.

28. The method of claim 27 wherein said clinical pages section comprises Medications &

Allergies, Immunizations, Patient Intake Apps, Physical Exams, Progress Notes, Consultations, Operative Notes, ER Reports, Hospital Summaries, EKGs, Imaging Reports, Special Tests, Labs &

Cultures, Therapy Notes, Billing &

Insurance, and Other sub-sections.

29. The method of claim 11 further comprising, providing to said patient a Medical Summary (MS) report, said MS report comprising said categorized documents organized by sections, said sections comprising a selected clinical pages section.

30. The method of claim 29 wherein said selected clinical pages section comprises Medications &

Allergies, Immunizations, Physical Exams, Progress Notes, Consultations, Operative Notes, ER Reports, Hospital Summaries, EKGs, Imaging Reports, Special Tests, Labs &

Cultures, Therapy Notes, and Patient Added Pages sub-sections.

31. The method of claim 11 further comprising, searching for a doctor'"'"'s location using a customized search engine.

32. A method for a patient accessing said patient'"'"'s medical records originating from a plurality of healthcare providers, said method comprising:

collecting from said plurality of healthcare providers said patient'"'"'s medical records;

categorizing a plurality of documents of said patient'"'"'s medical records according to a categorization system;

storing in a storage area of a central computer storage said categorized plurality of documents, said storage area under control of said patient; and

displaying a document log of said categorized plurality of documents to said patient.

33. The method of claim 32 further comprising displaying a time line graph indicating a date when a document of said categorized plurality of documents was created.

34. The method of claim 32 wherein said document log comprises an inventory of said categorized plurality of documents sorted by document ID, page type, author of said document, specialization of said author, record provider, or document date.

35. The method of claim 32 wherein said document log is sorted by date in reverse chronological order.

36. The method of claim 32 wherein said document log comprises a link to a display of a document of said categorized plurality of documents.

37. A system for centrally managing a plurality of medical records of a patient distributed across a plurality of healthcare providers, said system comprising:

a collection module for collecting from said plurality of healthcare providers said plurality of medical records,

a computerized categorization system for categorizing each medical record of said plurality of medical records, wherein said categorization system is the same for all healthcare providers of said plurality of healthcare providers;

a patient directed central storage area for electronically storing said categorized plurality of medical records; and

a retrieval module for retrieving an ordered plurality of documents of said categorized plurality of medical records, wherein said ordered plurality of documents is arranged using at least one of a plurality of criteria, said plurality of criteria based on said computerized categorization system.

38. The method of claim 37 further comprising a display for displaying said ordered plurality of documents.

39. The method of claim 38 wherein said display for presenting comprises a Web browser.

40. The method of claim 37 further comprising a distribution module for creating a CD, email, facsimile document, or printed document comprising information in said ordered plurality of documents.

41. The method of claim 37 further comprising a search engine application stored in a computer readable medium for locating a doctor or an organization of said plurality of healthcare providers.

42. The method of claim 37 wherein said categorization system comprises:

document ID, page type, author of said document, specialization of said author, provider of the record, and date of said document.

43. A method of centrally managing medical records of a patient authored by a plurality of healthcare providers, said method comprising:

collecting from said plurality of healthcare providers a plurality of medical records, wherein said plurality of medical records comprise a plurality of paper based documents, and wherein said plurality of healthcare providers comprise a past and a current health care provider;

classifying each page of said plurality of paper based documents using classes of a classification system common across said plurality of healthcare providers;

converting each page of said plurality of paper based documents to an electronic image;

storing each electronic image in a computer readable medium wherein access to said computer readable medium is authorized by said patient;

retrieving an organized subset of said electronic images, using at least one of a plurality of criteria; and

displaying an electronic image of said organized subset.

44. The method of claim 43 wherein said classifying each page comprises adding a header and a footer to each page, wherein said header comprises a first group of classes of said classification system and said footer comprises a second group of classes of said classification system.

45. The method of claim 44 wherein said first group comprises:

a document ID, page type, patient name, and member ID.

46. The method of claim 45 wherein said page type is a medical category selected from a group consisting of:

Medications &

Allergies, Immunizations, Patient Intake Apps, Physical Exams, Progress Notes, Consultations, Operative Notes, ER Reports, Hospital Summaries, EKGs, Imaging Reports, Special Tests, Labs &

Cultures, Therapy Notes, Billing &

Insurance, and Other.

47. The method of claim 44 wherein said second group comprises:

author of said page, author'"'"'s specialization, if a doctor, and creation date of said page.

48. The method of claim 43 wherein said classification system comprises:

a document ID, page type, patient name, member ID, author of said page, author'"'"'s specialization, if a doctor, and creation date of said page.

49. A system for centrally managing a plurality of medical records of a patient originating from a plurality of healthcare providers, said system comprising:

a backend server for receiving said plurality of medical records from said plurality of healthcare providers, wherein each document of said plurality of medical records is categorized;

a database connected to said backend server for storing said categorized documents, wherein access to said categorized documents is controlled by said patient; and

a Web server connected to said backend server and to a client system, wherein said Web server processes a search request by said client system for retrieving a set of ordered documents of said categorized documents, said set arranged by using at least one of a plurality of criteria.

50. The system of claim 49 further comprising a scanner coupled to said backend server for converting a paper-based document of said plurality of medical records to an electronic image for storing in said database.

51. The system of claim 49 further comprising a search engine for locating a healthcare provider of said plurality of healthcare providers.

52. The system of claim 49 further comprising a window displaying a current collection status of a patient'"'"'s medical records from a healthcare provider of said plurality of healthcare providers.

53. A method in a computer system for displaying a document log of a plurality of medical records of a patient, comprising:

displaying a table comprising a plurality of rows, wherein each row comprises a plurality of columns, wherein a column of said plurality of columns comprises a plurality of cells associated with a category of a plurality of categories; and

displaying document ID data in a cell of said plurality of cells of a row of said plurality of rows, wherein said document ID data identifies a document in said plurality of medical records.

54. The method of claim 53 wherein said plurality of categories comprises:

document ID, page type, author of said document, specialization of said author, provider of the record, and date of said document.

55. The method of claim 53 wherein said document ID data comprises a hyperlink to an electronic image of said document, and wherein, when said hyperlink is selected, said electronic image is displayed.

56. A method, using a computer, for enabling a patient to comment on a medical record of said patient, comprising:

searching for an electronic image of said medical record using a category assigned to said medical record, said electronic image stored in a database, wherein access to said electronic image is controlled by said patient;

receiving a patient'"'"'s comments; and

electronically linking said patient'"'"'s comments with said electronic image.

57. The method of claim 56 further comprising displaying said patient'"'"'s comments concurrently with said electronic image.

58. The method of claim 56 further comprising storing in said database said patient'"'"'s comments, and retrieving said patient'"'"'s comments, when said electronic image is displayed.

59. The method of claim 56 wherein said category is selected from a group consisting of document ID, page type, patient name, member ID, author of said document, specialization of said author, provider of the record, and creation date of said document.

60. The method of claim 56 further comprising:

receiving a doctor'"'"'s comments; and

electronically linking said doctor'"'"'s comments with said electronic image.

61. A method in a computer system for displaying to a patient a document timeline of a plurality of documents in a patient'"'"'s medical records, comprising:

displaying a first axis having sequential calendar time units;

displaying a second axis listing said plurality of documents; and

providing an indication along said first axis of a creation date of at least one of said plurality of documents.

62. The method of claim 61 wherein said indication on said first axis includes a name of an author of said document and said date of creation.

63. The method of claim 61 wherein said listing of said plurality of documents is by medical sub-categories.

64. The method of claim 61 wherein a document of said plurality of documents comprises a document identifier, said document identifier comprising a hyperlink to an electronic image of said document, and wherein, when said hyperlink is selected, said electronic image is displayed.

65. The method of claim 61 wherein said calendar time unit is selected from a group consisting of day, month, and year.

66. A method in a computer system for displaying a progress note timeline of a plurality of progress notes in a patient'"'"'s medical records, comprising:

displaying a first axis indicating sequential calendar time units;

displaying a second axis indicating a total number of said plurality of progress notes for each sequential calendar time unit; and

providing an indication along said first axis of said total number of said plurality of progress notes with creation dates in a calendar time unit of said sequential calendar time units.

67. The method of claim 66 wherein said calendar time unit is selected from a group consisting of day, month, and year.

68. A method for using a patient'"'"'s medical records by a doctor, comprising clinical pages, stored in a patient directed computer storage area, said method comprising:

said doctor selecting a category of a plurality of categories categorizing said clinical pages;

retrieving from said computer storage area a subset of clinical pages, wherein said subset comprises a plurality of clinical pages belonging to said category and not designated private by said patient;

calculating an availability factor, wherein said availability factor is a ratio of a number of clinical pages belonging to said subset to a total number of clinical pages belonging to said category; and

displaying said availability factor to said doctor for use in evaluating completeness of said subset.

69. The method of claim 68 wherein said plurality of categories comprise a plurality of medical sub-categories of a page type category.

70. A method for using a patient'"'"'s medical records by a doctor, comprising clinical pages from a healthcare provider, stored in a patient directed computer storage area, said method comprising:

said doctor selecting a category of a plurality of categories categorizing said clinical pages;

retrieving from said computer storage area a subset of clinical pages belonging to said category;

calculating a source factor, wherein said source factor is a ratio of a number of clinical pages in said subset obtained directly from said healthcare provider to a total number of clinical pages in said subset; and

displaying said source factor to said doctor for use in evaluating reliability of said subset.

71. The method of claim 70 wherein said plurality of categories comprise a plurality of medical sub-categories of a page type category.

72. The method of claim 70 wherein said total number of clinical pages in said subset is a sum of clinical pages in said subset obtained directly from said healthcare provider plus clinical pages in said subset obtained via said patient.