Journal of Consumer Marketing

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the threats to patient privacy inherent in the movement to reduce health care costs by digitizing health care information.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper applies relevant organizational theories to the health care information privacy arena, and predicts different privacy outcomes depending on the model organizations adopt to manage their information processing practices.

Findings – Public policy makers who value preservation of patient health care information privacy, can predict the relative safety of information based on the organizational model used by companies which handle that data. Propositions advanced by these theories to explain business processes are reviewed to the extent they help explore the relationships between the users and managers of the digitized health records, and the privacy of the patients' health-records. The paper offers a series of implications for marketers based on the framework.

Research limitations/implications – The findings are most applicable to health care systems that do not already sacrifice privacy in the name of economy.

Practical implications – The findings can be used to insure the security of health care information.

Originality/value – The paper addresses a recent trend motivated by the need to make health care accessible to more people. Rising health care costs have forced lawmakers and marketers to seek more efficient processes to reduce costs. One unintended consequence is that economies sacrifice privacy.