Abstract
In 2009, Kagawa University received funding for a campaign to treat diabetes. With this funding, we are developing a data-sharing system between clinics and hospitals for improving the quality of diabetes care. For this system, we are establishing a privacy policy based on that of a preexisting clinical data-sharing system called “Kagawa Medical Internet Exchange” (K–MIX). The Department of Basic Medicine at Kagawa University supports the campaign and plans to perform research on diabetes by analyzing the patients' blood and urine. Currently, we are revising the specific research protocol because it includes both long-term patient follow-up and needed research data. Written informed consent will be obtained from all patients prior to using their data and specimens for research. Although the research protocol is not yet finalized, we have a definitive policy to prevent patient identification by using the demographic information of the clinical data set. After setting the policy details, they will be applied to patients. The policy details for patients will be included in the final research protocol. We are also considering the information ethics for large e-health systems and privacy protection for patients having other diseases.
