I came across a recent blog post by physician Mark Frisse that talks about what he believes – and welcomes — to be a growing interest in personal health records, especially online PHRs. Dr. Frisse is a professor of biomedical informatics at Vanderbilt University (biomedical informatics is a term used to describe the organization, use and management of health information) and he calls PHRs "a critical factor in better health care."His blog post posits that there will be "struggles for power" over ownership of the PHR. "Who will really own the record?" Good question. As a new user of a PHR (you can read about my first attempt at starting my own here) I’d like the answer to "who owns it" be" me and my doctor."But I know it’s not that simple, yet I’m hoping it can become simple. If the medical community and consumers can together craft a personal health record program that can also be used as a bona fide medical record, I think we’ll have a revolution on our hands. If creators of personal health record software can make that software easy to use and easy to update FOR CONSUMERS, I think consumers will take to it easily. The problem as I understand it now - and I readily admit I’m just in the beginning stages of creating my own PHR – is that starting one can be tedious and a chore for consumers raised in a "I want it when I want it I want it, and when I want it, I want it NOW" culture. After all, I may know a PHR can help me and my family. I may know that I really should take more control over my own health care. But who has the time? Between work, between keeping a household, between watching over our children, between trying to have some semblance of a personal life – between taking three hours to have a date with my husband in the only three-hour window of our week – or putting together a personal health record ("Ooo! Sexy!") which would I or you or anyone choose? Sorry, PHR, but my husband is cuter. I’ve an idea that might help solve that problem. I’m going to think on it a bit and I’ll talk about it in my next post.