First Discussion Topic: Internet and EHealth.
The internet and Ehealth (electronic health) are drastically changing
the way healthcare is delivered. Ehealth, in particular telemedicine,
brought new light during (and currently) the pandemic on how
patients were able to receive care. A new report from the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) found that massive
increases in the use of telehealth helped maintain some health care
access during the COVID-19 pandemic, with specialists like
behavioral health providers seeing the highest telehealth utilization
relative to other providers (HHS 2021). Ehealth (telemed) services
went from around 840,000 in 2019 to 52.7 million in 2020. Without
this influence in the medical system, millions of patients would not
have been able to be seen and treated. a The expansion of e-health will
allow medicine and technology to meet, giving patients the
opportunity to obtain, view or interact with their health information
online. It will allow providers to communicate with their patients and
each other in ways that are more efficient and that could offer access
to more accurate information that will positively affect the overall
healthcare experience (CMS 2021).
Second Discussion Topic: Technology Diffusion
While cost, safety, benefit, and risk are all very important topics to
consider, I think that in healthcare safety is the biggest concern that
federal legislation should be the most focused on when it comes to
technology diffusion. If an emerging technology is not safe for a
patient, it defeats the purpose of the technology completely, which is
to improve patient care. This could be with new electronic systems,
like Ehealth, or it could be with a new piece of equipment. “Any form
of technology may adversely affect the quality and safety of care if it
is designed or implemented improperly or is misinterpreted. Not only
must the technology or device be designed to be safe, it must also be
operated safely within a safe workflow process” (The Joint
Commission,2008). When it comes to data safety, there are acts put
in place by the government, such as the privacy act of 1974, which
governs the collection, maintenance, use, and dissemination of
information about individuals that is maintained in systems of records
by federal agencies (DOJ 2021). There is also The Health Insurance
Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA),which is also a
federal law implementing national standards to protect sensitive
patient health information from being disclosed without the patient’s
consent or knowledge (CDC 2018).
References
HHS. (2021). New HHS Study Shows 63-Fold Increase in Medicare Telehealth
Utilization During the Pandemic. Retrieved from
https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2021/12/03/new-hhs-study-shows-63-fold-
increase-in-medicare-telehealth-utilization-during-pandemic.html
CMS (2021). E-Health General Information. Retrieved from
https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/E-Health/EHealthGenInfo
The Joint Commission. (2008). a Sentinel Event Alert 42: Safely implementing
health information and converging technologies. Retrieved from
https://www.jointcommission.org/-/media/tjc/documents/resources/patient-
safety-topics/sentinel-event/sea_42.pdf
DOJ. (2021). Privacy act of 1974. Retrieved from
https://www.justice.gov/opcl/privacy-act-
1974#:~:text=The%20Privacy%20Act%20of%201974,of%20records%20by%20fed
eral%20agencies.
CDC. (2018). Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).
retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/phlp/publications/topic/hipaa.html
