Presidential Innovation Fellows: Blue Button for America
The Presidential Innovation Fellows program pairs top innovators from the private sector, non-profits, and academia with top innovators in government to collaborate on solutions that aim to deliver significant results in six months. These projects have straightforward goals: to improve the lives of the American people, save taxpayer money, and fuel job creation. This is innovation aimed at making a difference for all Americans.
Blue Button for America
Developing tools that will help individuals utilize their own health records -- current medications and drug allergies, claims and treatment data, and lab reports -- to improve their health and healthcare.
What is Blue Button for America?
Most people in the United States still do not have easy access to their health records, and many don't know that the Federal government has taken a large step towards solving the problem. The Department of Veterans Affairs – working with the Department of Health & Human Services, the Department of Defense, and others – has made these advances with a program called Blue Button, which is a capability that enables individuals to securely download their own health information via a simple text file. It includes information such as current medications and drug allergies, claims and treatment data, and lab reports. Today, Blue Button is available to Veterans, uniformed service members, and Medicare beneficiaries, and almost a million people have downloaded their own health information. The Blue Button for America project aims to empower all Americans, working to spread implementation voluntarily by the private sector and helping to stimulate the development of tools that can help individuals utilize their own data to improve their health and healthcare.
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