Most Hospitals Offer Patients Electronic Access to Medical Records

This post was originally published on http://www.healthpopuli.com/ on September 14, 2016.

The number of hospitals offering patients electronic access to their health information grew seven times between 2013 and 2015. Electronic health records access has gone mainstream in America, according to the latest findings by The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC-HIT).
The data are detailed in Electronic Capabilities for Patient Engagement among U.S. Non-Federal Acute Care Hospitals: 2012-2015, an ONC Data Brief.
Two in three U.S. patients can now view, download, and transmit their personal health information, shown in the bar chart. This hockey-stick growth, from 10% in 2013 to 69% in 2015, results from the HITECH Act, part of the Stimulus Bill which provided financial incentives to health care providers to adopt and implement electronic health records (EHRs).
95% of hospitals currently provide patients the ability to electronically view their personal health information, followed by 87% of hospitals that enable patients to download their data, and 71%, the ability to transmit personal health information.
Hospitals that offer the three EHR functions to patients tend to be larger institutions: fewer critical access and smaller hospitals provide patients with the ability to electronically view, download, and transmit their health information. Transmitting data is a bigger challenge for smaller institutions.
There are additional electronic rec...

Source: Disruptive Women in Health Care - September 15, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: dw at disruptivewomen.net Tags: Electronic Health Records Health IT Source Type: blogs