Will PHRs survive?

If you would have stated those three terms (EHR, EMR or PHR) to me few weeks ago, I would have not even have begun to know the difference.  Actually, I just thought they were different names for the same thing. I know better now. I am also of the mind set that PHRs do not currently balance.  Brian Dolan (2011) wrote an article in which he listed 10 reasons why Google Health failed. They are:

1. Google Health was not fun or social
2. Google Health was not trustworthy
3. Google Health was too cumbersome
4. Google Health did not involve doctors
5. It was hard for Google to partner with insurance companies
6. It was too hard to overcome the current reimbursement barriers
7. Google Health was poorly marketed
8. Google Health received poor C-level support
9. Google Health had no advertising opportunity
10. Google Health was not useful to consumers (Dolan, B., 2011)

As you can see five out of 10 of these reasons was based on consumer use.  Even you stated in your previous post that you wished that a doctor could be involved, which coincides with number four.  I am not saying that all PHRs are like Google Health, but you can see how it is difficult to get these types of operations up and running.  EHRs and EMRs are all clinical based so they are faring well. As I stated in my original post, if PHRs could find some cohesiveness and then be integrated, there are a lot of opportunities. 

With the demise of Google Health, this does not mean the demise of PHRs.  I actually believe that this may be a key tool in the future.  The world is moving towards the mobile devices and so many transactions today are moving towards the on-line environment. It is only a matter of time, in my opinion, that "mobile health" will see a renewed emergence.  In 2008 a survey was dconducted on perceptions of HIEs and PHRs.  Patel, Dhopeshwarkar, Edwards, Barrón, Sparenborg & Kaushal  (2010), surveyed 117 respondents and a majority of them stated that they would use PHRs based on certain factors.

• 51% would use PHRs if being treated for a chronic illness
• 90% of the people would use PHRs from the group of respondents with some college education
• 84% of the respondents who had shared personal information over the Internet in the past would use PHRs (Patel, V. N. et al, 2010)

In conclusion, there were other factors, but this shows that as people are more educated, and as they use the Internet more for other daily transactions, this may increase the adoption of PHRs in the future.  Google Health may have failed, but maybe the timing for this was not right.  People are becoming more tech savvy and I am sure we will see a greater adoption of PHRs in the near future.

References:
Dolan, B.  (2011 June 27).  10 Reasons why Google Health failed.  Retrieved from http://mobihealthnews.com/11480/10-reasons-why-google-health-failed/

Patel, V. N., Dhopeshwarkar, R. V., Edwards, A., Barrón, Y., Sparenborg, J. & Kaudhal, R.  (2010 July 29).  Consumer Support for Health Information Exchange and Personal Health Records: A Regional Health Information Organization Survey.  Journal of Medical Systems, 36(3), 1043-1052.  DOI: 10.1007/s10916-010-9566-0