Doreen Rosenstrauch
DoRo Institute
Abstract Title:
The Nurse as Health Data Advocate: Empowering Patients Through Self-Sovereign Data Governance and Ethical AI in HealthcareBiography:
Dr. Doreen Rosenstrauch is a physician-scientist, registered nurse, and healthcare executive holding an MD, PhD, RN, and MPA-HCA, with Fellowship designations in the American Heart Association (FAHA) and U.S. board certification of the American College of Healthcare Executives (FACHE). As Founder of the DrDoRo® Institute and HÄLSA™ Health Data Agency, she pioneers AI-powered, patient-centered health data governance. A recognized interdisciplinary leader in clinical medicine, nursing, health informatics, and AI ethics, Dr. Rosenstrauch advocates for self-sovereign data models that return control to patients and equity to care. She brings a uniquely clinical voice to global conversations on the future of ethical, AI-driven healthcare.
Research Interests:
Background: Nurses are the healthcare system's most trusted patient advocates and its most prolific generators of clinical data — yet patients remain largely unaware that their health information is routinely traded, fragmented across siloed systems, and increasingly exposed to cybersecurity breaches. In 2025, the United States recorded 508 major healthcare data breaches averaging $10.93 million each, while data brokers sold the records of approximately 280 million patients annually without their consent. This ethical crisis directly undermines the safety, equity, and quality of care that nursing professionals are educated and sworn to uphold. Objective: This presentation equips nursing educators and practitioners with the conceptual framework, clinical evidence, and practical tools needed to champion patient health data sovereignty — positioning nurses as frontline leaders of ethical AI-driven healthcare transformation. Methods: We present a synthesis of current evidence in nursing informatics, health data governance, and AI ethics alongside modeled outcomes from the HÄLSA™ Health Data Agency — a patent-pending smartphone application enabling patients to own, control, and ethically monetize their personal health data in compliance with HIPAA, GDPR, and HL7 FHIR standards. Results: Fragmented health data contributes to an 11.1% diagnostic error rate and over $220 billion in annual medical debt. Integrated, patient-controlled data access is modeled to reduce diagnostic errors by 10–15% and documentation burden by up to 25%. NIST-aligned research further demonstrates 15–20% bias reductions in AI trained on ethically sourced, consented datasets — advancing health equity outcomes that align directly with nursing's core values. Conclusions: Nursing education must evolve to include health data literacy, digital ethics, and patient advocacy in the age of AI. Nurses who understand and teach self-sovereign data principles are uniquely positioned to protect patients, reduce preventable harm, and lead the transformation toward equitable, AI-powered healthcare — because Your Health Is Your Wealth. KEYWORDS Nursing educationHealth data sovereigntyPatient advocacyEthical AI in healthcareHealth data literacy