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Ethical And Security Issues Of HIT

894 Words4 Pages

Ethical and Security Issues of HIT
The excitement of health information technology (HIT) has given freedom to the public to have access to health care records and has created a problem with ethical and security issues. For the most part, access to personal health information (PHI) is available to anyone who requests it. The problem health care organizations face is the ability for individuals to duplicate and transmit their information to unauthorized persons. More and more people are signing to have access to personal health records (PHR) without any standards to protect sensitive data (Brown 2009). The health care facility has the responsibility to protect the information that individuals are supposed to have and ensure it meets the entire …show more content…

Most importantly, nurses need to follow the standards and requirement of their organization when working with computers. Even though the availability of the EHR has made it easier for health care professionals to access health information, it has created a challenge to the health industry to protect health information from hackers. It is important that nurses are aware of the new electronic technology and learn how to manage and use the processes although nurses are known to resist change (Chand 2014). It is very important to maintain hospital standards before the release of any health information; health care professionals should use proper techniques that will safeguard patient information and protect it from inappropriate uses (Brown 2009). Nurses should monitor their surroundings when documenting information and opening files that contain information about the patient. The ability to have access to patient’s information has made it easier for the health care industry to interact with the patient, however; if everyone has access to their records it makes it difficult for health care professionals to protect vital information. As explained by Brown, 2009, one of the HIPAA standards makes it possible for individuals to have access to their health information online. This can give …show more content…

Most companies use personal digital assistants like laptops and iPads for collecting patient’s data (McGonigle &Mastrian 2015). This can become an ethical concern for some patients who may not understand how information moves through the electronic system and may think that nurses are using their personal devices to collect their private information. Some nurse may not be familiar with the operating system, as a result, misplace information to wrong areas of the chart. For example at my work place, we have a new device called MC40 (a cell phone that does many functions for the nurses). This device also has the ability to take pictures of skin issues and place them in the chart. However, sometimes it can be a problem as in this situation where a patient’s wound was posted as their profile picture. This took a while for IT to be contacted and

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