Application: Standards, Privacy and Security
With the advancement in technology, protection of health information has become a mandatory process. It is basically an iterative process that is altered by the modifications in technology and the changes in the healthcare.
The various information technology applications related to the medical care in all the countries have been a great breakthrough as these have promised high quality of health care, no risk to privacy, decreased cost and many more benefits. Designing of the health application requires complete analysis of the system.
The security and privacy of information related to the health are important for all those who are delivering health care and is extremely important for those who care for patients ("Privacy and Security Issues", 2016). This is due to the fact that if there is any disclosure of the patient’s condition, it may affect the patient mental and physical conditions. Doctors can only make the best decisions when they have a complete access to all the relevant information about the patient’s medical history. The inability to access this data may delay the clinical decisions and may affect the patient’s health as well.
Privacy protection for health provides valuable benefits to the society. The primary objective of protecting personal privacy is to protect the interests of individuals (Nass, Levit, Gostin & Rule, 2009). There are a number of reasons for protecting the privacy, such as to maintain the individuality, respect, and personal autonomy of the patient. The privacy protection will also lead to confidence and improvements in the health care system as well.
The health information systems require continual assessment of risks associated with the IT systems related to health. The two main considerations that need to be kept in mind while assessing the health system are –
Administrative, technical and physical practices used within the system.
All health care providers are necessary to follow the Federal and State laws that help them protect the patient information about their health. The government regulation that guide all the decisions of the systems related to health is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) which was started in 1996. Every stakeholder involved in the health IT, i.e. the payers, vendors and patients themselves must ensure the protection of health information of the patient.
The system utilizes different safeguards in order to maintain the system. The safeguards come under different categories –
Administrative
Physical
Technical
The administrative safeguards are all the procedures and policies that exist in the practice in order to protect the certainty of the patient’s health.
Physical safeguards refer to all the hardware and the facilities that store the health information of the patient. The physical threats may affect the security of the system. Only the authorized personnel should be able to access any kind of confidential information related to the patient’s health.
Technical safeguards are built into the IT system in order to protect the health information of the patient. This includes measures to encrypt and decrypt the health information in the electronic system, measures to limit the access to confidential information and to keep a check on any unauthorized access.
The electronic health records have streamlined the medical care process and the skills of trained health professionals will be required in the future to create a reliable and efficient healthcare system.
References
Privacy and Security Issues. (2016). Hrsa.gov. Retrieved 31 March 2016, from
http://www.hrsa.gov/healthit/toolbox/HIVAIDSCaretoolbox/SecurityAndPrivacyIssues/index.html
Nass, S., Levit, L., Gostin, L., & Rule, I. (2009). The Value and Importance of Health
Information Privacy. National Academies Press (US). Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9579/
