title: Linking patients' records across organizations while maintaining anonymity.
abstract: In an health information exchange (HIE) project, linking patients' health records across organizations while maintaining appropriate patients anonymity is essential. Anonymous identifiers created from various combinations of personal identifiers using one way encryption function were evaluated for linkage quality between two synthesized databases. Preliminary results show that such anonymous identifiers (IDs) based on date of birth, zip code and last name or first name can link records with high specificity and sensitivity.
authors.affiliation: Health Informatics, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
authors.forename: Boonchai
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Kijsanayotin
authors.forename: Stuart M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Speedie
authors.forename: Donald P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Connelly
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003219:Confidentiality; D006801:Humans; D008498:Medical Record Linkage / Q000379:methods*; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized; D010355:Patient Identification Systems