Reference no: EM132159078
Directors of health information services departments, privacy officers, and other HIM professionals may use research on policies and practices and patients’ access to revise their own departmental policies and procedures.
Patients’ access to their health information is protected under law and regulation. Patients access their health information through patient portals and through requests for paper and electronic copies of their health records. However, the laws and regulations protecting this access conflict. Therefore, an HIM researcher conducted a survey study to obtain information on current health information management policies and practices related to patients’ access to their health information (Murphy- Abdouch 2015, 1).
The researcher noted the following federal laws and regulations and state laws on patients’ access:
• HIPAA allows providers to charge patients a “reasonable” fee based on the costs of responding with paper and electronic copies
• The HITECH Act mandates that providers’ maximum fee cannot exceed the labor and supply costs to respond to the patient’s request
• Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ advises that, under Meaningful Use (authorized by American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and HITECH), charging patients for access to their health information is inappropriate
• States’ rates vary among states with some states setting flat fees, others allowing per-page amounts, and others combining flat fees and per-page rates The following conflicts exist among federal laws and regulations and state laws on patients’ access:
• Some of these states’ rates may be higher than reasonable cost because they do not reflect the actual unique costs of each provider • States rates with CMS’ advise that patients’ access be free
• HIPAA and HITECH provisions allow reasonable costs while CMS’ advice on Meaningful Use says charging patients is inappropriate Patient-centered healthcare initiatives are underway to enable patients to take more responsibility for their healthcare. To do so, patients must be able to access, utilize, and share their health information. Access to health information through patient portals and other electronic means is increasing with the adoption of electronic health records (EHRs), but not all providers have EHRs or patient portals and not all information may be available electronically. Patients are expected to continue to request paper and electronic copies of their medical records. This research project was initiated to obtain up-to-date data regarding health information management (HIM) practices related to patients’ access to their health information. Murphy-Abdouch, K. 2015.
Patient access to personal health information: Regulation v. reality. Perspectives in Health Information Management Winter:1-10.
a. Find the article by Murphy-Abdouch in PubMed Central.
b. Who did the researcher survey and why?
c. In your opinion, based on the information in the article, are the results likely to be representative of the current practices related to patients’ access to their health information?
d. How could an HIM practitioner use the information in this article?