Today's connected and busy medical practices can benefit greatly by adopting a patient portal or combined patient and doctor portal. The right software, system integration and security allows any practice to create one portal that benefits patients, physicians and other medical and administrative staff. External doctors can sign in and provide second opinions, consult the patient’s EHR, provide specialist advice and send other treatment information. Family members can also sign up and review the details of complex diagnoses, lab tests and treatments. Each type of portal user can access only authorized information while enjoying the full protection of a HIPAA-compliant system. Patient and physician adoption of patient and doctor portals and personal health records is growing steadily according to a study published in “The American Journal of Managed Care.” In fact, adoption rates are increasing exponentially, although socioeconomic status does affect how quickly demographic groups start using personal health records and patient portals. [1] Integration and custom development are integral aspects of creating a useful, secure and patient- and doctor-friendly portal. Research shows that integration of a medical …show more content…
Creating a portal won’t provide the greatest possible access and efficiency unless the portal can communicate seamlessly with patient records and the medical practice’s software applications and resources. That means connecting with accounting and billing information, CRM software, affiliated labs and service-provider partners. Integrating systems into a robust API layer adds a layer of security beyond the firewalls to comply with HIPAA. At the same time, patients, staff and third-parties can communicate securely while many tasks at the medical practice are streamlined, prioritized and