Part 1
The focus of this research is on Congressman Pedro Pierluisi who serves in the as the representative of Puerto Rico. He is from the Democratic Party. He can be contacted at 2410 Rayburn House Office Building. His phone is 202-225-2615 and his email is http://pierluisi.house.gov.
Currently, the key major stakeholders involved in the bill are the congressmen since the bill is still in the committee stage in the house. The contents of the bill are being deliberated on by the subcommittee on health. As such, the real benefits of the bill have not achieved yet. However, in the event that the bill passes through the subsequent steps, the patients being taken care of in the acute care settings will be the main beneficiaries. The probable benefits that will accrue from this bill are in line with the advantages of utilizing these technologies. EHR are useful in providing real-time clinical information to the physicians and other care providers to satisfactorily address the needs of these patients. Secondly, the access to the clinical information is safe due to the security checks put in place. Thirdly, the overall health of patients in the acute care unit will be improved since the focus will not only be on the encounter between the doctor and the patient only (King et al., 2014). From a broader perspective, there will be an increase in the multiple avenues through which information can be retrieved to assist in the maintenance the general populace health.
It is, however, worth noting that this bill has got very minimal chances of being passed into law because of various underlying factors affecting it. This bill was first introduced to the congress on the 21st of March 2013 by Representative Pierluisi with the same title but a different bill number which was H.R 1379 – 113th Congress (2013-2014) (Congress.gov, 2013). This bill did not, however, move past by the committee stage considering the fact that the sponsor comes from the Democratic Party which is a minority in the congress. As such, garnering the required numbers to push the bill through the house was a challenge because of the issue of the tyranny of numbers. From the foregoing, therefore, the Bill H.R 1225 has got very minimal chances of being enacted into law mainly due to political differences and ideologies between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party (GovTrack.us, 2015).
Part 2
The adoption of this bill will greatly improve operations in healthcare settings. However, there are also legal and ethical implications surrounding its adoption. The ethical issues in line with the approval of this bill are based on the possible benefits from its implementation. As such, the Utilitarianism theory is congruent with the implementation of this bill. The use of EHR in the healthcare provision process is useful since it results in desirable patient outcomes from the advantages that have been linked with its usage (Butts & Rich, 2012). Such a realization is a reflection of the foundations of the theory which supports what is only best for the people. As such, the outcomes of enacting the law will be beneficial to the general population.
The first legal issue surrounding the use of EHR is the risk for claims from medical malpractices. There are probable errors likely to occur during the transition system of the bill from the familiar paperwork. As such, there are bound to be an increase in malpractice liability to the physicians attending to patients a situation that can eventually result in lawsuits (Hospital Review, 2016). Secondly, in the event that proper spell checks are not observed in the system, the possibilities of medical errors occurring are very high. The likelihood for medical faults includes pharmaceutical errors in terms of dosages and the resulting side effects. Another factor in line with medical errors is related to the doctors using a copy-and-paste kind of medical diagnoses that result in a trail of subsequent medical errors (Hospital Review, 2016). Such a situation is the possible genesis of medical lawsuits. Finally, breaches in the conventional operation of the electronic health records may result in theft due to unauthorized access to the system. As such, loss of records and human errors are the possible avenues for medical lawsuits being filed by the patients or their families towards the acute care hospital.
References
Butts, J. B., & Rich, K. L. (2012). Nursing ethics. Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Congress.gov. (2013). All Info - H.R.1379 - 113th Congress (2013-2014): Puerto Rico Hospital HITECH Amendments Act of 2013 | Congress.gov | Library of Congress. Retrieved from https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/1379/all-info
Congress.Gov. (2015). All Info - H.R.1225 - 114th Congress (2015-2016): Puerto Rico Hospital HITECH Amendments Act of 2015 | Congress.gov | Library of Congress. Retrieved from https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/1225/all-info#
GovTrack.us. (2015). Puerto Rico Hospital HITECH Amendments Act of 2015 (H.R. 1225) - GovTrack.us. Retrieved from https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/hr1225#
Hospital Review. (2016). 5 Legal Issues Surrounding Electronic Medical Records. Retrieved from http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/legal-regulatory-issues/5-legal-issues-surrounding-electronic-medical-records.html
King, J., Patel, V., Jamoom, E. W., & Furukawa, M. F. (2014). Clinical benefits of electronic health record use: national findings. Health services research,49(1pt2), 392-404.
