Nursing Informatics Task #1

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was passed by congress in 1996, and helps to ensure the privacy and security of Electronic Health Records (EHR's). By following the rules and regulations set forth under HIPAA, we can ensure the safety of patients' EHR's. We are responsible for protecting patients' records, and there are many measures we can take in order do this. Firstly, we must always keep patients' health information private. This means no discussing the records with people that are not authorized to know, and even then, we should only disclose the minimum necessary amount of information possible. For covered entities, we must designate a privacy and security officer to ensure the privacy

EHR was created to have a technical way to securely exchange private and personal medical health information in hopes to improve the quality of care, decrease medical errors, limiting paper use, reduction of health care cost, and increasing a person access to affordable health care. A mandate was created for EHR stating that health records can be accessible to all facilities with patients having the capability to access their own health records at any time. Ameliorating the quality and convenience of care given to a patient, allow for cost saving measures, engage the patient and family to participate in their care, improve accuracy of medical diagnosis, and enhance the efficiency of the overall outcome of the patients’ health.

Lately I have been hearing a lot about security of patient’s health records and how people are losing their jobs behind accessing information that they have no need to be in. It got me to wondering just how secure our personal information is from prying eyes and how who is alerted when these prying eye are in information that doesn’t concern them. So, when I ran across this article “Security Audits of Electronic Health Information” and “HIPAA Security Rule Overview” it caught my eye and curiosity on how they might work hand in hand when it comes to protecting what information is accessed by personnel. So, I choose these articles to get more information on this topic.

Personal health information can be anything from general information such as the patient’s name, medical record number, social security number, address, or even their date of birth. Any health information pertains to the patient such as diagnosis, medical history, medications. Employees must make sure no medical paper work is visible as well as screen protectors are on all computer screens, where you may be documenting health information. It is important that all health care employees log out of a computer when they leave that station. Employees that are aware of a breach of confidently should use their change of command set up by their facility also notify their incidents or situations to their hospital’s privacy officer. To promote the proper use of health information, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, or HITECH Act, was created. Prior to the HITECH Act, HIPAA violations only resulted in minimal fines. Violations would result in a $100 fine, and a covered entity could only achieve a total of $25,000 in fines in one calendar year. The HITECH Act has broken the violations down into four categories, and has distributed the fines across them based on the category of violation. The first category would be a violations that caused by someone who didn’t know they were violating HIPAA. The fines for this tier are in the range

HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) has many key components in the operations of daily clinical and administrative services. In a physician's practice they must maintain physical security of all health care information. For example, patient files are no longer able to be sitting out unless they are in a closed and locked area and sign in sheets should only ask for minimal information. Accessibility to individual identifiable health information is restricted and should be used on a "need to know basis". Billing employees should not have access to the clinical notes and they do not need to know a patient's financial information. An employee may disclose only the "minimum information necessary". These regulations require

“Curricula must be aligned with the practice setting (Veltri, 2012). At this time all staff will be handed out a step by step book with screen shots on how to operate the new EMR. This includes opening a patient’s chart, accessing medications, past medical records, and any progress or clinical notes. To accommodate all different types of learning styles to individuals these training sessions will also be recorded for staff to view multiple times or at any time. “Because the purpose of clinical learning is to foster application of theory to practice, clinical learning activities should be related to what is being taught in the classroom” (Gaberson, 2012). Teaching sessions will be mandatory for all staff and their will be make up classes the next week for the individuals who will be off the days of the sessions. A copy of the step by step booklet will also be emailed a power point presentation that they can save to their desktop so they can reference back if they develop any questions. “The lecture method presents information effectively; creative strategies provide diversions that reinforce key material or area of emphasis” (Herman, 2008). During the week there will be small quizzes staff need to take and receive an 90% or higher to show compensates in the EMR system. If someone fails to achieve this percentage they will attend the class again with another quiz at the end of the day. At the end of the week comprehensive test will be given as well and the same 90% grade. The test is very important as it will ensure that staff is able to chart and document in the appropriate section, know where to find vital information such as medications, past medical and surgeries history. Staff who achieves thee highest percentage will have the opportunity to become “super users”

HIPAA Security & Privacy Rule instructs entities who have administrative control over patient’s personal information implement technical and non-technical strategies to mitigate or eliminate vulnerabilities. Statue permits hospital and other entities to use any security measures that is judicious, pertinent, and effectively deployed ("HHS.gov," 2015).

Before a health care organization implements an EMR system, they should have a security system in place, which includes “access control” component. Access control within an EMR system is controlled by distinct user roles and access levels, the enforcement of strong login passwords, severe user verification/authorization and user inactivity locks. Health care of professionals regardless of their level, each have specific permissions for accessing data. Even though the organization have the right security system in place to prevent unauthorized users from access patient records, autonomous patients will expect to have access to his or her records with ease. Access their record will ensure that their information is correct and safe.

In the modern world technology is everywhere and it affects everyone’s daily life. People are constantly attached to cell phones, laptops, and other electronics, which all have affected how people live their lives. Technology is also a large part of the healthcare system today. There are many electronics and technologies that are used in health care, such as electronic health record, medication bar code scanning, electronic documentation, telenursing, and there are many more forms of technology that impact nursing. One technology that stands out is the electronic health record. The electronic health record, also referred to as EHR, is an electronic version of a patient’s chart, and it contains is a list of the patient’s current medications, allergies, laboratory results, diagnoses, immunization dates, images, treatments, and medical history (“Learn EHR Basics,” 2014). The purpose of the electronic health record is to have a patient’s health care record available to health care providers nationwide, but the patient can decide who has access to their record (Edwards, Chiweda, Oyinka, McKay, & Wiles, 2011). The electronic health record is a very important technology in health care and it impacts nurses, nursing care, and has a significant impact on patient outcomes.

How can EMR’s improve the nursing process now and in the future? Having had the op-portunity to perform my clinicals in three different Emergency Departments in the past two years and being exposed to both the positive and negative to both paper and paperless medical records Training new nurses is vital for an accurate EMR. Bober, M., & Boonstra, J.

Besides the disadvantages of (EMR)’s the advantages pose great benefits to patient care and efficiency. The greater use of electronic medical records or health records can reduce wait times, of seeing doctors or waiting for test results. All staff would need to cohesively work out the technical challenges and software data. With sophisticated IT

In a world full of electronics it would only seem logical to have health records electronic. Not only are medical records efficient, reliable, and quick to access, new technology allow patients to access their own personal medical records with a simple to use login and password. “People are asking whether any kind of electronic records can be made safe. If one is looking for a 100% privacy guarantee, the answer is no”(Thede, 2010). At my hospital, upon every admission we ask the patient for a password for friends and family to have to have if they would like an update on the patient 's condition. We do not let visitors come up and see the patient without the patient 's consent. In doing these things, we help to ensure the safety and protection of the patient 's health information and privacy.

As a nurse, most of us are probably using an electronic health record (EHR) to assess and document patient information. To have an Informatics Nurse Specialist (INS), at the community hospital would greater impact the healthcare provided to patients by healthcare professionals. An INS is a professional nurse who has extensive knowledge and skills in computer technology and information management (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2012, p. 116). This nurse would be an active participator in designing the electronic tools that we as healthcare workers use daily. Having the EHRs readily available, professionally done, user friendly, and less time consuming would allow more time for patient care. This nurse would provide the documents needed to enhance better

Electronic medical records had a great impact in the ushering in of the age of Nursing Informatics. (Himss, 2010)EMRS present healthcare professionals with the ability to retrieve and organize data in a quick and efficient approach. With information so readily available, patient safety increases and we know that patient cost goes down. This happens because patient medications, allergies, history, demographic, and treatment information is more collectively available.

This paper details the need for creating a database to track the conducting of group sessions by nurses in a large healthcare institution ward, and presents an overview of a plan for effective database usage. The knowledge and information sharing by and among nurses in this group is both required by administration and desirable from a healthcare perspective, yet the perceived difficulties in actually creating such a database have prevented its implementation. A conceptual data model, including the key entities and relationships that will be involved in maintaining and utilizing the database, is provided below, and a visualization of the relationships involved in the database appears in the appendix.