Digitizing medical records should never have been done. The reason is simple, anything digital, not matter what it is or where it’s at is subject to being hacked.
The last 15 years of my medical records/health info management career, I focused on helping hospitals with transition to the EMR. I didn’t work with Epic but with two other systems. It was a constant project of tweaking the system in response to doctors’ and others’ requests, but it certainly made life easier when it ran right.
Having said that, I’m glad to have retired from all that!
Point #1 - they are not YOUR medical records under the law. They are your Doctor’s medial records. Dont believe me? When the courts want a copy of your medical records, who receives the supena? You or your doctor?
Point #2 - the records are NOT for your benefit or to improve your health care. They are there for the Doctor’s, clinic’ and hospital’s legal protection from malpractice accusations.
I am of the opinion that until pints 1 and 2 are changed in law, we will continue with the current system, consequences be damned.
As a physician, I’ve worked with Epic. They’ve ruined patient care and physician education. Don’t get me started.
EPIC fail?
I then made an appointment with a doctor in city B. I asked the office if they would like me to have my records sent from the city A hospital. They told me that they had already used Epic to suck them out of the city A hospital computer.
As far as I could recall, I had not yet informed the first hospital which doctor I would be seeing in city B.
To me this seemed to imply that there are ways in which Epic can get around HIPAA. It should be necessary to give permission at the sending office before records can be transferred.
I had a referral and a followup procedure done last fall. My doctors office uses Epic. Neither the referral nor the offsite procedure are in my patient record.
Vitals like BP are not recorded in their system.
It sucks