British Columbia Enacts e-Health Legislation

British Columbia recently enacted the e-Health (Personal Health Information Access and Protection of Privacy) Act (e-Health Act), which facilitates the creation of consolidated databases of electronic personal health information (Health Information Banks) and is intended to provide patients with "faster, safer, and better health care" by providing health-care professionals with secure access to patients' information in a timely and effective manner.

Features of the e-Health Act include the following:

• creating a framework for the creation of Health Information Banks;
  
  
• allowing individuals to exercise control over disclosure of their personal health information, through the issuance of "disclosure directives" by which the individual may request that access to his or her personal health information be blocked;