Introduction
Patients can use any Internet-connected computer to get to their portal, which is a safe online service that lets them look at their personal health information. They might need to make a username and password in order to get to their medical records (McAlearney et al., 2019). Just like any other system, using these technologies will have both pros and cons. Patients have a right to privacy in their medical records, so doctors and other medical professionals are morally and legally required to handle sensitive medical and personal information in the right way. But there are now new things that make it harder to keep secrets. If nursing informatics are put into place, the health care system might get better.
The Patient Portal System’s Disadvantages and Benefits
When it comes to improving the quality of treatment, patient portals have both pros and cons, such as making patients more involved and making it hard to get patients to sign up. It’s not enough to tell patients to use patient portals and hope that everything works out. Patient portals are often used to get patients more involved. On the other hand, patient portals might be seen as a mix of pros and cons, advantages and disadvantages. Patient portals are a new challenge for provider workflows because they let patients be involved in every part of their care (Longacre et al., 2021). However, it’s getting harder and harder to get patients to use them. Doctors can get a better idea of how patients will be involved in the future if they know the pros and cons of patient portals.
Pros
Better Communication with Chronically Ill People
One of the most obvious benefits of a patient portal is that it makes it easier for both patients and experts to talk to each other. This is especially helpful for people who have been sick for a long time. Using the encrypted messaging features of the patient portal, people with chronic diseases can talk to their doctors whenever they have a simple question. This stops people from calling or going to the doctor’s office when they don’t need to. A recent study by Kaiser Permanente of Southern California (KPSC) found that patient participation in online patient portals can improve treatment for chronic illnesses by about 10%, depending on the condition (Latulipe et al., 2018). People are more likely to take care of their health if their providers remind them and if they can talk to their doctors about problems.
More Specific and Accurate Patient Information
Through patient portals, patients can access and talk to their health information. This means that the information is completer and more accurate. Patients can look at their data to see if there are any mistakes or oddities in their medical records. They can either send a secure message to their doctor or talk about it at their next appointment. Even though patients don’t have direct control over these factors, giving them some control over their data gives doctors more accurate and complete information about their patients, which improves the quality of therapy.
Patients are increasingly participating in their own care.
One of the best things about patient portals is that they give patients more power over their own health care by giving them more control over it. Patients who use patient portals to access their health information and their doctors’ decisions are more likely to see themselves as active participants in their care, rather than as passive recipients. Research in the industry backs this up. A 2013 study from the Portland VA Medical Center found that patients who had access to their health records through the VA’s MyHealtheVet patient portal felt more in charge of their health. The stories of patients show how sharing notes could help them take a more active role in their care. Everyone in the focus group used their medical records to learn more about their health conditions, better understand their doctors’ points of view, and speak up for themselves during care discussions. When patients weren’t in a hurry, they had more time to think about what health information meant and why it was important. When looking for things on the Internet, records were a good place to start.
Cons
Concerns about the security of health data
Patient portals let people get to their own private health information (PHI). People being able to look at their own medical records might seem like a good thing, but it could be dangerous. A hacker or healthcare data thief could get more access to a patient’s information through a patient portal. This would make the patient more likely to have their identity stolen. But if the right steps are taken, these problems can be kept to a minimum.
The Department of Health and Human Services recently changed the rules about how patients can get access to private health information (Graham et al., 2020). This part talks about how patients can get to their medical records and how HIPAA keeps this information safe. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT says that patient portals usually have a number of technical measures to protect the security of health data (ONC).
It is difficult to gain patient acceptance.
Most people who don’t like patient portals say that it’s hard for experts to get patient approval. Most of the time, professionals are more excited about the health benefits of using a patient portal than patients are. Meaningful use standards put in place by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) for patient portals make it harder to get people to use them (Abouelmehdi, Beni-Hessane, & Khaloufi, 2018). Even though doctors don’t have much control over what their patients do, they are sometimes reprimanded when they and their nurses fail to meet meaningful use certification criteria.
Even though there is no one solution that works for everyone, a number of doctors have talked about how they encourage patients to use the patient portal. The ONC says that a positive medical review can go a long way toward getting a patient to use a new technology. This is because people tend to put a lot of stock in what their doctors say. ONC says that the Primary Health Medical Group’s Patient Portal Initiatives work best when practitioners encourage patients to use the portal. This is the case because patients look up to and trust professionals. One therapist says that saying “Thank you for using the portal” at the end of each chat makes patients more likely to use the service. With the help of the ONC talking points, doctors can stress how important it is for patients to use the patient portal.
Difficulties Regarding Patient Confidentiality
Patients have the right to have their personal information kept private and private. When it comes to building trust between a doctor and a patient, confidentiality is the most important thing. Even though the law says that confidentiality is a must outside of court, it is sometimes necessary to break confidentiality and it is not always illegal to do so. Some people think that doctors are required by law to protect the privacy of their patients. But it’s not always possible to have complete privacy, as there are a few exceptions. In general, moral standards decide whether a secret can be kept partially or completely (Graham et al., 2020). To keep the privacy of all medical records safe, it is important to figure out how big the problem is. Before giving a solution, the main goal of this section is to figure out how big the problem is by looking at how worried doctors are about patient privacy in clinical settings. In this situation, doctors should follow a set of ethical rules. There are three levels of privacy in healthcare settings: organizational ethics, management, and the way the doctor and patient talk to each other.
Ethical Considerations in Organizations
Our healthcare system depends on the safety of electronic health records. They can use the passwords of other users if they forget their own. There are no rules about how strong passwords can be, and it is not possible to keep track of who can see patient information. I don’t know how much information should be kept in electronic health records, but I think it’s important to understand what they can and can’t do. I don’t fill out forms that ask for sensitive information because I want to protect the patient’s privacy. Our e-health system gives doctors access to all patient information, and if they forget their own passwords, they often share them with other doctors. Important information about a patient should not be written down, because it could be shared without permission (Ho, Ho, & Chung, 2019). In the e-health system, it should be clear how much information each doctor can see. In the past few years, cyberspace has become a major privacy risk. Even though there are no rules in our country, it is a big problem that people share information online. It is okay to use the Internet to diagnose and treat patients, even if patient information is shared. Laws should back up the idea that professional interactions should be based on ethics.
Government Management Issues
Management’s ethical problems have not been solved because there are not enough laws and rules. When privacy is not taken for granted, there are neither norms nor clarity. When making decisions and settling disagreements, some ethicists look at the risk to a third party, while others put the patient’s value first. It is legal to share information about a patient, and it is even okay to do so without the patient’s permission. To protect a patient’s privacy, a doctor must find a balance between the public interest and the patient’s health. If a woman tests positive for HPV, she does not have to tell her husband. But if she tests positive for HBS or HIV and his health is in danger, one must tell him (Ho, Ho, & Chung, 2019). One must always tell the patient ahead of time. When a patient’s life is more important than their right to privacy, we may have to give out private information to save their life.
No one could have known what the patient would gain or what the third party would lose. Even though workplace confidentiality is usually not necessary, there is no clear policy or law that says it is okay to talk about a patient without their permission or who is responsible if it is. Under the right circumstances, the person responsible for the leak must be found. In this case, the doctor is to blame, and the whole hospital staff needs to be told. No one teaches our residents how to keep a secret, and we don’t know how to teach them.
Problems in the Physician-Patient Relationship
Since there are no specific rules or restrictions in place to keep information private, they must be set by national policy. Due to their hard work and the fact that many patients don’t know what their rights are, doctors may not realize how important it is to protect patient privacy. Also, many doctors and other medical staff don’t know how important it is to keep patient information private. This has to do with the patient’s right to privacy, which most patients don’t know about. It’s a problem for everyone. The doctor must be aware of and think about how people feel in the society where he or she works (Kaissis et al., 2020). Is it possible that sharing a patient’s information could make their condition better or worse? So, the decision should be made by the doctor, who should know how important it is to keep patient information private. It is okay to talk about patients during grand rounds and morning reports so that students and society as a whole can benefit. Before putting the names of patients in the morning report, I like to get their permission, but my colleagues don’t.
Children and teenagers are the most at risk. In this part of the study, we looked at how hard it is for kids and teens to stay anonymous when they go to the doctor and how the doctor and patient relationship works. Clearly, national laws need to be made so that anyone can report child abuse to the police without worrying about getting in trouble. Teen parents should first learn about the health of their child. I think that’s what the law says we have to do. I think it would be very helpful if the ethics committee came up with a policy or way to keep things private.
Informatics Nurse Processes
Nursing informatics is a very important part of a nurse’s job. This type of nursing combines clinical practice with information science to make sure that patients’ electronic health records are safe, correct, and private. According to Saputra & Arif (2018), nursing informaticists will focus on electronic health record recording and healthcare information technology to improve the care they give to patients. The way nursing informatics is done is based on making processes and finding system solutions to problems that patients and staff have. The following methods are used by professionals in nursing informatics to make procedures work for different caregivers.
In the first stage, the patient, his or her family, and other sources are asked to give information about the person. The information gathered gives a full picture of what the patient needs.
During the process of diagnosis, the information gathered is looked at to figure out what the patient needs. It is very important that the results match the clinical picture of the patient. Does the information match how the patient looks, how they feel, and what you find?
Making a plan that puts the most important goals first (results or planned step). This will only happen if both the patient and the nurse agree to it. Education can be a very important part of helping the patient understand the goals.
Now is the time to make the plan happen. In this time, people can get an education, medical care, and care from nurses (Harerimana et al., 2021). Imagine that one of your patients has been hurt and has a cut on their ankle. They will treat your wounds and tell you how to take your medicines, change your bandages, and what to eat to get better faster.
During this evaluation phase, they will evaluate how well the goals were met, how the wound is healing, and the effects of the nursing actions, such as checking how well the medicines are working. The question is about how the person dealt with the situation (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2021). They will watch how the wound heals and write down any changes in the patient’s medical files. In this step, the plans are changed if the evaluation shows that the goals have not been met.
Conclusion
Problems with healthcare technology can happen with patient portals. Portals have the potential to help healthcare providers in a number of ways, but they must first get past a number of problems. Patient portals can help more people learn and take part in a well-thought-out plan. It’s also true that patients today have a lot on their plates. Some of these are organizational ethics, management, and the relationship between a doctor and a patient. It’s important to remember, though, that a number of ideas have been put forward that, if put into action, can help ease the worries. Informatics solutions are often used by nurses to find patients who are more likely to get serious diseases and take preventive steps right away. Automated alerts help doctors avoid making mistakes by telling them about possible risks, like a patient’s allergy or a drug interaction that could be dangerous. The introduction of nursing informatics is a turning point in the health care industry.
References
Abouelmehdi, K., Beni-Hessane, A., & Khaloufi, H. (2018). Big healthcare data: preserving security and privacy. Journal of big data, 5(1), 1-18.
Graham, T. A., Ali, S., Avdagovska, M., & Ballermann, M. (2020). Effects of a web-based patient portal on patient satisfaction and missed appointment rates: survey study. Journal of medical Internet research, 22(5), e17955.
Ho, K. F., Ho, C. H., & Chung, M. H. (2019). Theoretical integration of user satisfaction and technology acceptance of the nursing process information system. PLoS One, 14(6), e0217622.
Harerimana, A., Wicking, K., Biedermann, N., & Yates, K. (2021). Integrating nursing informatics into undergraduate nursing education in Africa: A scoping review. International Nursing Review, 68(3), 420-433.
Kaissis, G. A., Makowski, M. R., Rückert, D., & Braren, R. F. (2020). Secure, privacy-preserving and federated machine learning in medical imaging. Nature Machine Intelligence, 2(6), 305-311.
Latulipe, C., Quandt, S. A., Melius, K. A., Bertoni, A., Miller Jr, D. P., Smith, D., & Arcury, T. A. (2018). Insights into older adult patient concerns around the caregiver proxy portal use: qualitative interview study. Journal of medical Internet research, 20(11), e10524.
Longacre, M. L., Keleher, C., Chwistek, M., Odelberg, M., Siemon, M., Collins, M., & Fang, C. Y. (2021, February). Developing an Integrated Caregiver Patient-Portal System. In Healthcare (Vol. 9, No. 2, p. 193). Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute.
McAlearney, A. S., Sieck, C. J., Gaughan, A., Fareed, N., Volney, J., & Huerta, T. R. (2019). Patients’ perceptions of portal use across care settings: qualitative study. Journal of medical Internet research, 21(6), e13126.
McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. (2021). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge. Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Saputra, C., & Arif, Y. (2019). Nursing informatics system in health care delivery. KnE Life Sciences, 38-46.
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