Question

Imagine you work in a hospital and as you are stepping off of the elevator, you notice a piece of paper on the floor. You pick it up and see the above information on Susan Bowers. Understanding the importance of a person’s private health information confidentiality, you immediately take this information to the hospital’s IT Security Officer who monitors the EHR and its users. After tracking the “footprints” left behind when the users accessed Susan Bowers’ chart, the Security Officer was able to determine who printed the information.

Choose from one of the following instances and write a hospital policy or procedure for the instance you selected. Include your policy/procedure in the same Word document as the Susan Bowers information you pasted and highlighted:

(Option 1) A nursing student does not have time to write everything down from the patient’s EHR record before leaving clinical in the afternoon. The student has asked to print the patient’s personal health history to take home. Write a hospital policy on printing patient information to be removed from the unit.

OR

(Option 2) You are the charge nurse in a busy pediatric unit. The case manager for the pediatric unit wants to discuss discharge plans with you on four of the patients. To make it easier, the case manager prints out the most current information from each of the patients’ charts to take notes on while talking with you. Write a procedure for the destruction of the printed information once the case manager is finished with them.

Answer 1

Hospital Policy/Procedure

Policy: Reasonable safety measure have to be set in place in order to protect    patient medical records, in all types of formats (written, oral, or electronic) from intentional or intentional use or disclosure. Employees are expected to comply with Hospital A guidelines.

Procedure:

Printing Medical Records:

1. Medical records should be printed from a safe location.

2. Printed Copies of medical records should not be used in a deceitful way that may harm a patient’s personal information.

3. If anyone see’s and employee printing or making copies of medical records in an inappropriate way it should be reported immediately.

Medical Records removed from the Premises:

1. Once the Medical Records are taken out of the Hospital A by the person who checked them out they are automatically responsible for them.

2. The Medical Record must be secured and protected at all times.

3. Medical Records should never be left unattended in public or misplaced.

4. If in a vehicle the medical Records should be faced down or covered so no passer-by can see any of its contents.

5. At home the medical record should be kept in a secure location where no one can easily access it.

6. If any part of the medical record goes missing or is stolen it is important that it is reported to the HIM Department immediately.

References:

AHIMA. "Limiting the Use of the Social Security Number in Healthcare." Journal of AHIMA 82, no.6 (June 2011): 52-56. Retrieved October 29, 2014 from http://library.ahima.org/xpedio/groups/public/documents/ahima/bok1_049016.hcsp?dDocName=bok1_049016

Blair, A. (2014). Social Security numbers on wristbands worry VA patients. Retrieved October 29, 2014 from http://www.kpho.com/story/24659178/va-patients-concerned-about-id-theft-ssn-number-printed-on-wristbands#ixzz3HYvzrI00

McCann, E. (2014). 4-year long HIPAA breach uncovered.Healthcare IT News. Retrieved October 28, 2014 from http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/four-year-long-hipaa-data-breach-discovered