Medicare launches Web health-record pilot

WASHINGTON, June 20 (UPI) -- Some U.S. Medicare beneficiaries will have access to electronic health records as part of a new pilot project, the agency said Wednesday.

The program will give participating seniors a personal health record they can access online that contains information about medical conditions, hospitalizations, doctor visits and medications as part of an overall push for Medicare-wide adoption of electronic health records.

Records will be automatically updated using Medicare data, and beneficiaries will be able to add their own information and choose whether to share the record with healthcare providers, the agency said.

To choose the best personal health record format, Medicare is partnering with four private plans that already offer the records: HIP USA, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

At the end of the 18-month pilot, Medicare will collect data on which features beneficiaries prefer and ways to get seniors to use their records, according to the agency.