Should We Be Able To Access Our Health Information Online?

     As a class we had a debate on whether clients/patients should have online access to their personal health information. I was on the ‘con’ side of this debate. After hearing both sides and their arguments, I am still unsure whether I agree or disagree with this topic. In Confidentiality and Privacy-Personal Health Information (2009), “the legislation recognizes that personal health information belongs to clients and is simply being housed in health care facilities” (Canadian Nurses Association, p.6). This is a quote that the ‘pro’ side used to back up their opinions. Allowing clients access to health information will aid them in making informed decisions about their health. The ‘pro’ side also emphasized that this will promote patients in being partners with health professionals when it comes to their care. I somewhat disagree with this statement. I believe that once patients are able to access their own health information from home, this will limit their dependency on health professionals and diminish the amount of person-to-person contact. In Canadian Fundamentals of Nursing, Potter and Perry (2010) state how “establishing presence with a client enhances your ability to learn form the client, which enhances nursing care” (p.271). Once this is gone, nursing will change, and patients may no longer feel the need to visit their health professionals. Some more points to back up the ‘con’ side is the inequality that may arise due to the fact that some people do not have access to computers or the literacy skills. Doctors also use more complex words that may confuse patients and arise worry. There is always a risk of hackers accessing personal information when using online-based technology. Lastly, according to the CNO (2009), there is “possible grounds for refusing access, including that it may present a risk of serious harm to the treatment or recovery of the client” (p.6). With this in mind, there is also certain information such as someone’s mental health, where if patients were to see this, it could add on anxiety. Having to sort out this type of information and deciding what to post online takes up valuable time. In order for myself to choose a side on this topic, I would need a physical representation of what this online health record looks like. My first thought on this topic was, is this site reliable? Will clients need to use passwords to login? Or would I type in my health card number?  

What do you think? Which side of this debate would you agree with? Leave a comment and let me know! 

     I came across this image on Google, which then led me to a Toronto Digital Journal website. The reason why I want to share this image onto my blog is because it visually displays a representation of Canadian consumers and their stance on whether patients should have full access, limited access or no access to their electronic medical records. From this data, I can see that 50% of these consumers would switch physicians in order to gain access to their records. Also, majority of these consumers (76%) believe they should have full online access to their health information. 

Here's the full link http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1499487

References

College of Nurses of Ontario. (2009). Confidentiality and Privacy-Personal Health Information.   

   Retrieved from http://www.cno.org/Global/docs/prac/41069_privacy.pdf

Perry, A. (2010). Caring in Nursing Practice. In P.A. Potter, A. G. Perry, J. C. Ross-Kerr & M.J. 

   Wood. Canadian Fundamentals of Nursing. (pp. 265 – 275) (4^th ed. Revised). Toronto: CAN, 

   Elsevier Canada.

How Do I Find a Reliable Source?

     This weeks group presentation incorporated a video as well as a case study to show us what reliable web sources look like and how to find them. In their study, they described a scenario of a 60-year-old man, whom had just come home from a walk and is now experiencing excessive sweating, fatigue, trouble breathing and nausea. As apart of our small groups, we were asked to search his symptoms online and see what sources we came across. The website I first landed on was WebMD, which opened a page based on heart disease according to the symptoms I typed into Google. This website I found did turn out to be reliable according to the pointers this group had included in their presentation. These pointers include the website having an “about us” tab, expert authors, an email or number to contact them through, advertisements, funding and up to date information. These are the reasons why I am sure the website I chose for this study was highly reliable. After class, I decided to go back onto this site to see what else it offered. I found it very interesting as I saw that it incorporates a section that allows you to make your own health folder. This is where you add any symptoms you are experiencing and then the site gives you the possible conditions you may have relating to your entries.  Everything stays in your folder, which you can open up and look back on for reference. This site truly has so much to offer, so be smart when self diagnosing yourself online and check out this website! 

http://symptoms.webmd.com/default.htm#introView

     My professor showed a video to the class this week, in which a man explained the importance of how online health information could save lives, including his. In his video, this man explains his story of how he was cured of kidney cancer. There were a few web sources this man described using in his search of symptoms. It was really neat to find out that he had used the same WebMD site that I had just found in class that week. 

Consumer Health Informatics and eHealth

     Consumer health informatics and eHealth was the topic for Week 5. What this means is the movement of people being able to access their health information using technologies available to them. The focus of this class was to make sense that technology is being modified and that health information is continuously changing the way it is being presented. 

If You Type It In, What Will You Find?

     My professor also created two group activities for the class to participate in. In both activities, we were asked to search online what information we could find on hand washing standards as well as different countries guidelines to doing breast self examinations. The point of these activities was to compare what search results we came across. Before this class I did not know to what extent Google tailored our results. The video we saw in class, TED, Eli Pariser: Beware online “filter bubbles”, shows us how Google even looks at what type of computer we are on, the browser we are using and our location to determine what links we come across. This really shocked me and has made me consider the fact that not everyone stumbles upon the same information online.

Why don’t you try this activity and compare with your friends. Do you both land on the same links? 

     I took this screenshot of an entry I found on an RN Journal website, where licensed nurses, educators, and nursing students can post articles that they see may be of interest to the nursing community. The article I came across is about nursing research and in this screen shot I highlighted the sentences that stood out to me. We as nurses spend a lot of time with our patients and throughout this time we learn the factors that are or will affect their health. When doing nursing research, we incorporate these aspects of the client in order to come to an appropriate and best solution.

Here’s the full link to their website, check it out and if you find any interesting articles why not post them!

 http://rnjournal.com/journal-of-nursing/conducting-nursing-research