Health Informatics Week 1: Patient Encounter Reflection Paper

This assignment is a critical reflection paper on health informatics, focusing on Chapter 1, "A Total Patient Encounter," and Chapter 2, "HIPAA, HITECH, and Medical Records." The student provides a synopsis of the chapters, discussing practice management programs, electronic health records (EHRs), government health information technology (HIT) initiatives, and the legal aspects of patient data protection, including HIPAA and HITECH. The student critiques the content, highlighting the importance of health information technology for patient data security and privacy, and discusses the impact of HIPAA security rules and HITECH breach notification rules on daily work. The reflection explores how the chapters changed the student's understanding of these topics and concludes with a summary of insights on the application of practice management programs and EHRs in healthcare settings. The paper emphasizes the practical application of the learned concepts and their significance in the healthcare industry.

Running head: TOTAL PATIENT ENCOUNTER
TOTAL PATIENT ENCOUNTER
Name of Student:
Name of University:
Author’s Note:

1TOTAL PATIENT ENCOUNTER
Introduction
The paper focuses on the total patient counter which deals with practice management and
Electronic Health Record. It is effective tool to keep a record of health and important information
of the patients. The paper outlines the government initiative taken to protect the private health
information which includes HIPAA, PQRI, ARRA, HIE, NHIN, PM program and others. The
chapter has explained documentation of patient encounter and use of clinical information
gathered such as research and education. Finally chapter has highlighted about function of EMR
program and PM program which is related to health, management, safety and handling of
financial terms.
Critique
According to me, the content of chapter was impressive as it has given all the relevant
information related to the electronic health record and related laws. It wisely covers all the topic
which was require to be learned.
From the chapter I have learned that health information technology is used to keep data
of patients safe and private and maintain health record which can be used for future assessment.
HIE enable sharing of the related information in private organization (Sittig & Singh, 2015).
There are many laws which focus on protection of health information of patient such as HIPAA.
HIPAA security rule and HITECH breach notification rule and helps to maintain privacy of
health information by preventing any breach through strict security system (Moore & Frye,
2019).

2TOTAL PATIENT ENCOUNTER
I will apply the learning in my daily work by circulating the policy information and
creating awareness in the form of poster to every health department. I will record the data of
patients by asking their consent in such a manner that will not be assessed by any other people.
The data will be stored and locked with the help of password. I will make sure that all the health
information is not being breached so strict security system will be used for it.
The chapter has changed my thoughts regarding HITECH, HIPPA and EMR as
previously I was knowing that such rules are applicable only to keep information private. I was
ignorant about the fact that such rule and EMR are also known to be used in legal issue, research,
education and for better public health and security (Amer, 2015). Hence, it has changed my
viewpoint and I came to know about the data which are protected from breach as I was not
familiar with this concept and I was not knowing about medical documentation and billing cycle.
Conclusion
Lastly, it can be said that the chapter has stated many facts which I was not knowing. The
chapter has given an insight regarding ways it can be applied in health care sector. However,
chapter has pose a positive impact on my thoughts. Practice Management and Electronic Health
Record can be applied and maintained in every health care sector. Earlier I use to think that such
tools are only applicable in hospital but from the learning of the chapter it made me
knowledgeable and gave idea that it can be assessed through our mobile phone as well.
Therefore, the chapter has helped me in acknowledging relevant information.

3TOTAL PATIENT ENCOUNTER
Reference
Amer, K. (2015). Informatics: Ethical use of genomic information and electronic medical
records. J. Am. Nurses Assoc, 20(2).
Moore, W., & Frye, S. A. (2019). A Review of the HIPAA, Part 1: History, PHI, and Privacy and
Security Rules. Journal of nuclear medicine technology, jnmt-119.
Sittig, D. F., & Singh, H. (2015). A new socio-technical model for studying health information
technology in complex adaptive healthcare systems. In Cognitive Informatics for
Biomedicine(pp. 59-80). Springer, Cham.