Personal Health Record
Discussion Question:
1. Case Study: A 65-year-old woman was just been diagnosed with Stage 3 non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. She was informed of this diagnosis in her primary care physician’s office. She leaves her physician’s office and goes home to review all of her tests and lab results with her family. She goes home and logs into her PHR. She is only able to pull up a portion of her test results. She calls her physician’s office with this concern. The office staff discussed that she had part of her lab work completed at a lab not connected to the organization, part was completed at the emergency room, and part was completed in the lab that is part of the doctor’s office organization.
The above scenario might be a scenario that you have commonly worked with in clinical practice. For many reasons, patients often receive healthcare from multiple organizations that might have different systems.
As you review this scenario, reflect and answer these questions for this discussion.
What are the pros and cons of the situation in the case study?
What safeguards are included in patient portals and PHRs to help patients and healthcare professionals ensure safety?
Do you agree or disagree with the way that a patient obtains Personal Health Records (PHRs)?
What are challenges for patients that do not have access to all of the PHRs? Remember, only portions of the EHRs are typically included in the PHRs.
**Please use two sources, the textbook and 1 outside source**
Sample Paper
Personal Health Record
What are the pros and cons of the situation in the case study?
The situation in the case study where a patient cannot effectively access their personal health records has some benefits and shortcomings. One of the benefits of the situation is that providing access to sufficient personal health records to a patient can help in the correction of medical errors in the provided records. PHRs can also allow a patient to have a broader knowledge of their health and what would be required in their treatment (Hebda et al., 2018).PHRs can also provide an opportunity for increased and effective communication between patients and healthcare providers. Finally, PHRs can help to boost the engagement of patients with their healthcare decision (Hebda et al., 2018).
In contrast, the shortcomings of the use of PHRs include cases where a patient experiences difficulties accessing their records, such as in the case study highlighted. Limited health literacy can also affect the ability of a patient to understand their personal health records (Roehrs et al., 2017). Another important shortcoming of PHR is the legal liability that physicians have in case the patient’s health records are accessed by third parties, such as in a case study where the patient wants to discuss her health records with all her family members. Concerns can therefore be expressed relating to the security of information provided in personal health records (Roehrs et al., 2017).
What safeguards are included in patient portals and PHRs to help patients and healthcare professionals ensure safety?
The safeguards included inpatient portals and PHRs that can help healthcare professionals and patients to ensure safety, including two-step verification, use of strong passwords, and use of patient biometric information as security systems in various patient portals (Hebda et al., 2018).
Do you agree or disagree with the way that a patient obtains Personal Health Records (PHRs)?
In the case study highlighted, I agree with the way the patient obtains their personal health records because she uses her personal devices in her home, which would be difficult for any third parties to access).
What are challenges for patients that do not have access to all of the PHRs? Remember, only portions of the EHRs are typically included in the PHRs.
The challenges for patients that do not access all of their PHRs include a lack of a deep understanding of their health concerns and the lack of engagement of such patients in their healthcare decisions (Roehrs et al., 2017.
References
Hebda, T., Hunter, K., & Czar, P. (2018). Handbook of Informatics for Nurses & Healthcare Professionals (6th ed.). Pearson.
Roehrs, A., da Costa, C. A., Righi, R. D. R., & de Oliveira, K. S. F. (2017). Personal Health Records: A Systematic Literature Review. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 19(1), e13. https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.5876
