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Health Information Compliance Report

Decent Essays

Users, stakeholders, and agencies access stored patient’s health information easy access via the Internet. An easy access offers better patient’s care, but also increases concerns regarding the safety and confidentiality of the information. Medical records are extremely personal and should never be shared with anyone without patient’s consent or as required by law. Our government has implemented laws to protect the consumer’s health records. Strict enforcement of the laws has been effective in limiting breaches of confidentiality, although there are plenty of cases where information was exposed intentionally or inadvertently. Discussion We use electronic health record to communicate between providers for clinical decisions, coordination of …show more content…

Users gain access to information according to their roles and responsibilities, so an office receptionist will not have the same access as a nurse. As part of HIPAA Security Rule we monitor and audit the information usage within the organization by examining systems activity, and we do so also to qualify for payments from Medicare and Medicaid (Damschroder et al., 2007). HIPAA requires that audit logs are kept for at least 6 years (De Moor, 2003). Additionally, firewalls and antivirus software protect data integrity against hacking and manipulation from outside or inside the organization. Alongside guarding information security and confidentiality, we must also assure that the information is accurate and readily available to consumers. The US Department of Health and Human Services encourages patients’ accessibility of their own health records, so they can provide information and correct errors (ONCHIT, 2013). After all, a mistake in a patient’s medical record can have a life altering …show more content…

In 1973, with the beginning of the computer age, the government adopted fundamental principle of information protection (Gelman R., 2008). In 1996, the federal government created the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) to protect medical health information instates and across state lines. The law aims to assure that only authorized individuals can access stored data; that they can only access it when they need to use it for an authorized purpose; and that what they see is accurate. Also, Under the HIPAA Privacy and Security Rules employers are accountable for the employee breach of confidentiality, and we all heard of instances when employee’s action lead to considerable fines to the employer. Additionally to HIPPA, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act mandates securing patient medical records information internally and

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