Question

Explain the purpose and impact of  HIT incentives and penalties by adopting a broad perspective. Also demonstrate your understanding of the policies involved and complexities of healthcare.

Subject-Healthcare Administration

Answer 1

Health Information Technology (HIT) is a health technology, which involves information technology, applicable to health and health care. It supports health information management across computerized systems. In addition to this it also ensures exchange of health information between providers, consumers, payers, and quality monitors. An example of the importance of this goal is that it is the major rationale behind the United States (US) national HIT Initiative, started by President Bush in 2004 and strengthened by President Obama in 2009 with the $19 billion HITECH Act under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). It strives to have every American’s medical records on computers by 2014. However, there are huge gaps between the status quo and the potential of HIT, mostly due to financial, cognitive, technological, security/privacy, social/cultural, and workforce challenges. Another report in 2008 which was conducted at four sites- 3 in United States ad 1 in Netherlands found the use of electronic health records (EHRs) as a great tool to improve the overall health, quality and efficiency of health care delivery system

Benefits of HIT

1. it improves efficiency and health care quality

2. improved overall productivity as defined in the report published by Affordable care act of 2010

3. Prevents medical errors

4. Also reduces health care cost

5. The efficiency of administration is benefitted as the records the patients can be quickly accessed thereby saving precious time and money

6. Definite decrease in paperwork

The penalties on HIT violation range from 100$ to 50,000$ per violation depending on the severity with a maximum penalty of 1.5million $ per year. It can also result in jail time.

Policies of HIT

1. HITECH act- The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 [PDF - 266 KB] provides HHS with the authority to establish programs to improve health care quality, safety, and efficiency through the promotion of health IT, including electronic health records and private and secure electronic health information exchange.

Although the implementation of HITECH has resulted in better clinical outcomes, increased efficiency and transparency, more clinical data which is readily available, improved health outcomes but the issues persist:-

a. Hacking and cyber crimes leave the patient vulnerable as information can be gleamed if the firewall is not effective. Data breaches are a big threat to the further propagation of this technology

b. The new findings of a patient must be immediately entered into the EHRs, or the healthcare provider would not be able to administer the new treatment or rectify the old treatment.

c. Some patients can become overly upset or panic when they see their patient files. Patients can misinterpret the information and start worrying needlessly.

d. Transitioning from paper to electronic files could result in patient data getting lost or entered incorrectly. Errors in treatment can occur from this, leaving healthcare professionals open to potential lawsuits.

e. Older records can be hard to read. These records are destroyed under the HITECH Act guidelines, leaving information out of a patient’s health record.     

2. FDASIA- The food and drug administration safety and innovation act signed in July, 2012 enables the authorities to promoting innovation to speed patient’s access to safe products and enhancing safety of drug supply chain.

3. HIPAA- The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 protects health insurance coverage for workers and their families when they change or lose their jobs, requires the establishment of national standards for electronic health care transactions, and requires establishment of national identifiers for providers, health insurance plans, and employers.

The issues which persisted were:-

1. Even though your privacy rights may be violated, you don’t have standing to sue companies because of their HIPAA violations.

2. There are shortcomings in enforcement of the act

3. Larger-sized companies need dedicated staff to work on the privacy of their patients. That results in extra costs that are eventually passed on to patients, and leads to an increase of their medical bills.

4. HIPPA privacy rules does not mandate that a hospital, doctor’s office or agency obtain your consent prior to submitting a claim to your insurance company

5. Companies often contract with other providers for services, such as billing and legal services. These contractors have access to patient records as part of doing their job. You don’t have a choice about that, and your consent is not required under HIPAA rules