California farmworkers will have Web-based PHRs
- By Nancy zz_Ferris
- Aug 06, 2008
About 5,000 migrant farmworkers and their families will have personal health records in the next nine months in a project funded by the California government.
The records will be available to patients via a Web portal. They have the option of allowing their doctors to view and update their records via a similar portal. All access is password-controlled.
La Cooperativa Campesina de California, an organization that provides support services to farmworkers, is making the PHR system, called MiVIA, available to farmworkers in San Joaquin County. The organization’s partners on the project include a local health system that operates mobile clinics, a community health center, California Human Development, Kaiser Permanente and the software’s developer, Access Strategies Inc.
The Sonoma, Calif., company also offers a PHR product called FollowMe. Cynthia Solomon, the company’s founder and chief executive officer, said deployment of the MiVIA PHRs will begin in October.
MiVIA is a comprehensive health record that includes information on the patient’s medical conditions, medications, procedures, lab results, demographic data and allergies. Providers can scan documents and images, such as X-rays, and import them into the PHR.
The patient or a health care provider can enter information. Each entry is labeled with the name of the person who entered it, and only that person can change it, Solomon said.
A summary record can be exported or printed. Users can also print cards that contain basic health information for use in emergencies or to overcome language barriers.
California’s Department of Managed Health Care is supporting the project with a $444,500 grant. “This grant will help to improve health care for local farmworkers, using advanced technology that will allow them to bring their personal health histories with them as they travel throughout the state to harvest crops,” said Cindy Ehnes, the department’s director, in a statement.
MiVIA’s success depends on outreach and the development of trust, Solomon said.
Access Strategies has other projects under way in Oregon and New York state.
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