Use Google Drive as a "Data Warehouse". You can use Google Drive to keep an archive of medical photos without violating privacy regulations. This is particularly useful for areas of medicine where it is appropriate to document visual changes over time, and there are no provisions for storing photos in the patients record. Google Drive, in conjunction with PicSafe, can be used to help you comply with HIPAA and HITECH regulations (see this HIPAA Compliance with G Suite and Cloud Identity article).
Setup
- Tap on the Settings button (on the primary form).
- Tap the Google Drive row under the Storage Integrations heading.
- Tap on the Link Google Drive Account button, and you'll be guided through the process to login to Google Drive.
Instructions
- Take a photo in PicSafe.
- (Optional) Enter or scan the Patient ID.
- Select Google Drive in the send screen.
Requirements
- A Google account. If you're doing a trial without using real patient data you can use any Google account (including free). If you're using real patient data, you'll need a Google account that is part of a G Suite account (required for Google Drive's HIPAA-compliant secure storage).
- PicSafe PRO (or be part of a PicSafe Enterprise account).
Notes
- "Reports" you upload to Google Drive can be found in an automatically generated "PicSafe" directory.
- A report contains photos (with metadata removed), and a PDF and XML file with the relevant details.
- Within your Google Drive account, you can use the search to find any of the information included in the "report" (e.g. patients name).
- The app uploads all reports over HTTPS. We do not encrypt reports using the key server when submitting to Google Drive as we assume that Google Drive stores all reports securely.
- While we believe PicSafe provides a system to allow doctors and comply with various privacy and medical record requirements, you should consult your lawyer or legal department. Note, too often we have seen excessive demands placed on processes to the point that they become impractical. Impractical requirements tend to get ignored, and doctors revert to more comfortable but insecure practices (using the default camera app or the camera within consumer-grade messaging apps). For everyone's sake, we need to avoid this!
What You Get
- Peace-of-mind. You are putting a system in place that encourages doctors to deliver to the standard of care, thereby mitigating the risk of legal action in a situation where a photo might have changed an adverse outcome.
- Privacy Regulation Compliance. You're providing a way for staff to securely capture and transmit medical photos while complying with privacy regulations and thereby mitigating your risk of massive fines.
- Medical Record Regulation Compliance. By providing the ability to store medical photos taken on your smartphone, you can comply with medical record regulations. Without this, many images are taken, but they don't make their way into the medical record.
- Accelerated access to specialist care. Without the worry of breaching privacy regulations, doctors will be more inclined to take medical photos.
- Enhanced education for trainees. As above, doctors will be more inclined to take medical photos and share them with those training.
- More efficient triaging of patients. Here massive savings can be achieved. Please see the use case for just some examples.