Professor, Group Urge Healthier Oversight of Patients’ Digital Data

01.10.2022

A University of Texas at Dallas professor who was part of a worldwide commission studying digital health technologies said there is not enough being done to govern how health data is protected and used.

Dr. Olivia Banner, associate professor and associate dean for graduate studies in the School of Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication, was one of 17 global experts to serve on the Governing Health Futures 2030: Growing Up in a Digital World commission, which was a joint project of The Lancet and Financial Times.

The commission, which met for approximately two years, recently released a report, published Nov. 6 in The Lancet, on how digital developments and artificial intelligence can support universal health coverage and improve the health and well-being of all people. The report provides specific actions that policymakers, private industry and communities can take to create a more equitable health future.

“While there is a general assumption that digital health technology can help those in most need of health care, we found that there is very little concern over the key issues that surround digital health, especially questions of data extraction and data privacy,” Banner said.

The commission proposed four areas for strengthening governance at the intersection of digital and health transformations:

• Decision-makers, health professionals and researchers should address digital technologies as increasingly important determinants of health.
• A whole-of-society effort is required to build a governance architecture that creates trust in digital health by enfranchising patients and vulnerable groups, ensuring health and digital rights, and regulating powerful players in the digital health ecosystem.
• A new approach to the collection and use of health data is needed, particularly with the aim of simultaneously protecting individual rights, promoting the public good potential of such data, and building a culture of data justice and equity.
• Decision-makers should invest in the enablers of digitally transformed health systems, a task that will require strong country ownership of digital health strategies and clear investment road maps that help prioritize those technologies that are most needed.

“Using governance to build systems can better promote patients’ interests in their data while protecting their privacy,” Banner said. “It can spur a sense of the collective good for which the data can be used.”

Banner, who researches issues of justice and equity in health-related technologies and media, said it was satisfying to share her work with a broader audience and to develop ideas with a diverse team.

“It was fascinating and rewarding to collaborate with such a diverse group of international experts, including policy analysts, data scientists, scientists and physicians,” she said.

–Phil Roth