Privacy and Security Solutions for Interoperable Health Information Exchange. Report on State Medical Record Access Laws

摘要

In the first phase of this project, 33 states and 1 territory (collectively referred to as states or state teams) conducted an assessment of variation in business practices, policies, and laws that might be perceived as barriers to electronic health information exchange, suggest possible solutions to these barriers, and prepare plans to implement these solutions. In doing so, the states focused on a number of different scenarios, including treatment, health information exchange, payment, research, and public health. As a result, the states identified a number of state laws and policies addressing the limitations on disclosure of health information between health care providers and third parties that may impede electronic health information exchange. The states also reported varied approaches to electronic health information exchange. Although differing types of health information organizations are being proposed in a number of states, others have reported health record banks or personal health record (PHR) systems as the emerging primary model for exchanging health information in their states. These various approaches to exchanging health information raise a number of issues about individuals' ability to access their own health information. This report is intended to further the initial work of this project by analyzing state laws that are intended to require health care providers (specifically, medical doctors and hospitals) to afford individuals access to their own health information and to identify potential barriers about this aspect of health information exchange.