Incomplete information can be more dangerous than wrong information.
A wrong entry in a chart looks wrong, and someone questions it. A missing one is invisible. The allergy nobody recorded, the medication another doctor prescribed, the scan from a different hospital: no one knows to ask about what they cannot see. And your medical history is never in one place.
Wrong versus missing, in 17 seconds. No sound.
Decisions made on half the picture
When your records are fragmented across EHR systems that don't share data, each doctor sees a fragment and cannot tell what is missing. Specialists miss the history and trends that would change a diagnosis or a treatment plan.
You pay for what you already have
Providers that can't exchange records order duplicate tests. You and your insurer pay twice for imaging and lab work that already exists somewhere else.
You are locked out of your own story
Intake forms on clipboards and a different login for every patient portal. The one person who was at every appointment is the one without the complete medical record.
Until recently this could not be fixed. Now it can, for three reasons.
The law
The 21st Century Cures Act prohibits information blocking. You have a legal right to electronic access to your own health information.
The technology
Interoperability standards such as HL7 FHIR let records move from any provider's EHR straight to your phone.
The intelligence
AI can now read a lifetime of records in seconds, connect what belongs together, and point to what is missing.