Don’t Wait for the EHR, Take Steps Now to Create a PHR
April 2nd, 2009
According to the Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society less than 1 percent (0.1%) of hospitals have a paperless shared electronic health record (EHR). Although almost 67 percent of hospitals have some degree of EHR in place, few have a system that allows patients and their physicians unfettered (but yet protected) access to essential, often crucial information about the patient’s health status. The Obama administration’s plan to fund EHR activities is a positive move towards making the universal EHR a national standard. However, given the current lack of adequate preparedness of most healthcare providers, the goal is unlikely to be accomplished before President Obama completes his second term in office. For the average healthcare consumer, the message is to act now on obtaining their health information and keeping it in an electronic format to be shared with all providers who treat you. The personal health record (PHR) is not a substitute for the EHR, but it does fill a gap. More importantly, it empowers each of us, as patients, in having control and knowledge over an essential part of our healthcare. Today, it is our responsibility to make sure that all of our healthcare providers have the information they need to provide us with the best possible healthcare. Except in highly integrated systems like Cleveland Clinic or the Mayo Clinic, we cannot assume that a specialist has access to information from our primary care visits. At least for now, that’s the patient’s responsibility…….
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April 3rd, 2009 at 7:50 am
Sure thing… but how? How exactly am I supposed to turn my file box full of paper, pictures, yellow copies, and so on into a medical record I can share? I mean apart from spending the rest of my life in front of a scanner.
April 3rd, 2009 at 12:01 pm
[...] Russo at Disruptive Women says patients should maintain their own electronic records: For the average healthcare consumer, the message is to act now on obtaining their health [...]
April 3rd, 2009 at 6:41 pm
I do believe that maintaining one’s own records is important yet impossible for most unless you are not sick. For a breast cancer patient…give me a break, just getting records transferred from one Oncologist to another was a two day job for me. Arguing over the confidentiality laws with staff in Dr.’s offices takes awhile. They won’t tranfer records of another Dr. to another Dr. etc,etc., etc. Let’s re-do the most recent HIPFA (? is that it?) at least, so it is easier for patients to tranfer and maintain records.
April 3rd, 2009 at 6:45 pm
Just one more thing, why don’t Primary Care doctor’s provide a copy of lab and radiology results automatically for the patient. We all know we are getting charged enough for the office visit to hear the results.
April 6th, 2009 at 8:20 am
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April 6th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Here are a few follow up suggestions based on the comments to the original post about maintaining your own health record….first, ask your physicians to participate in your quest with you. I have done this for my family and almost all of the docs have been willing to provide copies of all reports (like labs, x-rays) that they ordered for us. Some have even uploaded information directly to the secure websites we have created to store the information. Second, prioritize your information. In an effort not to have to scan endless amounts of paper, you may be able to determine on your own what’s of top importance. If not, ask your doctor. Or, better yet, ask the HIM staff at your hospital to help you. These folks are experts and are most likely willing to provide some informal (yet expert) advice to you. If you have received care at the hospital (or physician’s office) and have questions about your records and the documentation in them…under HIPAA, your healthcare provider is obligated to respond to questions you have about the records they have created for you. Remember, this is your right…..in fact, you also have the right to ask for modifications or clarifications to your record if you don’t agree or understand the information (i.e. like in the case when documentation is illegible….). Lastly, enlist one of the many web-based PHR companies out there to assit you with storing your records. You can reference the website sponsored by the American Health Information Management Association(AHIMA) http://www.myPHR.com for more information on how to proceed…..
April 7th, 2009 at 7:27 am
There are some great ‘high tech’ ideas here, and to those I’ll add two ‘high-touch’ ideas as well.
The first: Conceierge medical practices generally do a major review of existing medical records when the person signs-on, producing that record for them. Though the ‘upfront’ cost of that kind of care might seem daunting to some, I’d invite any critic to do a real ‘full cost’ analysis of trying to do this all yourself. Coordination costs are real costs, working days on end to get records is a real cost and in my experience, sometimes is not effective, no matter what the laws.Even for those of us who are healthy, this kind of thing drains our productivity. And, I’ll bet that after a year in concierge care, you’ll decide it’s not a question of ‘can I afford it?’ but ‘how can I not?’ The data are clear — health preceeds wealth. Stay (or get) healthy and it’s worth every dollar. It’s not a cost, it’s an investment.
Second, in a large company with a Medical Director, they might help. When I was at Merck in the late ’80′s the Doc there wanted us to be well informed (he was way ahead of his time) and said we should have our own recoreds and if we ever had difficulty getting them, he would get them for us. Granted, we had to organize them, but it avoided the arm wrestling with clinic staff! Given corprate wellness interests these days, those in larger companies may want to give that a try.