Let’s say that you were working in a state, county or city with a homeless person who had bipolar disorder, type 2 diabetes and multiple incidents of hospitalization. Obviously, there’s a lot to be done for that person from a variety of agencies in order to provide housing, address mental health needs, deal with the chronic health condition and so on. Wouldn’t it be good if the various agencies and departments involved could easily share information about the client?

Consider the advantages for the person. For one thing, he or she would no longer have to repeat intimate information to a series of different case workers. When the agencies are all able to see the same information about the same patient, they can coordinate to build upon the care others are providing, instead of starting from scratch every time.

From a state’s point of view, the efficiencies in service delivery from sharing data are obvious. They would save time and money by re-using the same data instead of gathering and storing it over and over again. In addition, it would help the state avoid duplication of services.

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To see the whole article, go to the article Privacy vs. Data Sharing BY KATHERINE BARRETT & RICHARD GREENE in Governing Magazine.