(Editor's Note: This guest blog was written by Julie A. Dooling, RHIT, a director of HIM Solutions for the American Health Information Management Association.) We live in a world where data and information are collected in many systems throughout our health care organizations, and most are often integrated into an EHR. Sharing information inside ...

In an April 20 press release, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) announced that it discovered a breach of patient information, which resulted when a document sent to an individual outside of UAMS for analysis of billing charges was not properly de-identified. A UAMS physician sent financial data to an individual who was not ...

If you attended the 2012 Annual HIMSS Conference & Exhibition, held in Las Vegas at the Venetian Sands Expo Center from Feb. 20-24, you were part of a record-breaking event. As of Friday morning, attendance at HIMSS12 reached 37,032 attendees, surpassing the HIMSS11 attendance figure of 31,500 attendees. They participated in more than 300 ...

For the first time in years, information technology (IT) leaders at healthcare organizations did not identify a lack of financial support for IT as an obstacle to implementation. So what's the problem? According to the 23rd Annual HIMSS Leadership Survey, released on Tuesday, one-quarter of respondents said adequate staffing resources within their ...

The Office of National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) will host a free day-long public Roundtable on ''Personal Health Records - Understanding the Evolving Landscape'' on Dec. 3. The Roundtable is designed to inform ONC's Congressionally mandated report on privacy and security requirements for non-Covered Entities ...

With patients across the country voicing a growing desire for greater engagement in and control over their medical care, a new study involving patients in Boston, Pennsylvania and Seattle will examine the impact of letting patients see the notes that doctors record during and after their visit. Funded through a $1.4 million grant from the ...

(Editor's note: The following is a message from Dr. David Blumenthal, National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, posted on May 14, 2010.) Private and secure health information exchange enables information to follow the patient when and where it is needed for better care. The Federal government is working to enable a wide range ...

What a week it's been for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Aside from celebrating the first anniversary of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), officials introduced several new comrades to the public. On Feb. 17, Joy Pritts was named chief privacy officer in the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) for Health ...

With all the prep for next week's American Health Information Management Association Convention and Exhibit and our HIM Team of the Year coverage (Yes, we have a winner!), I've been neglecting my Google Alerts. Well, I found some time this morning to browse the news on electronic health records (EHRs), and there's a whole lot of good, bad and ...

I'm what you might call ''doctor phobic.'' I haven't had a check up since 2001, and that was required to get into college. After high school, I moved to the Philadelphia suburbs from quiet nook upstate in a rural area lovingly referred to as the ''Polish Poconos.'' Where I grew up, you knew your doctors. We had one doctor who took care of my mom's ...