FHT Researchers to study cross-border health data transfers
Dr Rea Lehner and Assoc. Prof. Bernadette Richards receive seed funding to study global health data sharing together with Australian partners
The practice and ethical implications of cross-border sharing of medical data is an emerging issue in the field of health technologies. Future Health Technologies’ Health Data Governance and Value Creation module has secured seed funding to examine such data transfers in an exploratory study with its research partners in Australia.
Assoc. Prof. Bernadette Richards, Senior Scientist of Health Data Governance and Value Creation module, and Dr Rea Lehner, Associate Director of FHT, will be involved in this pilot project. Their project, ‘Cross Border Transfers of Medical and Health Related Data in Australia: Charting Privacy Requirements’, will examine challenges, barriers and enablers associated with cross border transfer of health data with researchers from the Australian Centre for Health Law Research (ACHLR) and Flinders University.
The seed funding will be used to begin mapping the regulatory landscape in Australia, with a planned broader, international exploration in mind.
By using Australia as an exemplar of the challenges faced by inter-jurisdictional data exchange, the project plans to seek out more international collaborators and work towards a framework for international data exchange.