This last December, an emergency room doc (thought to be female based on the handwriting) wrote a note to the widow of a patient she had treated in the Emergency Department of New York Presbyterian Hospital.

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Fins, chief of the division of medical ethics at Weill Cornell Medical College at New York Presbyterian Hospital, noted that doctor-patient confidentiality is considered sacrosanct, except in isolated cases where, to protect the patient or others, it can be breached.

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It also calls for new guidelines about what details nurses should include in a patient's record, and for the hospital to make it clear which nurse has prime responsibility for a patient.

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Larry Ponemon argues that at large providers like the Cleveland Clinic, new systems have helped centralize and control patient records instead of allowing to collect in disparate places around a hospital.

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