The Patient Portal is a secure, online method for patients to interact with information that their own healthcare provider allows them to view, as relevant to the Provider’s own EHR and Practice Management systems. It can include a patient’s lab results, current medication lists, scheduling of appointment functions, and even secure messaging and questions to the provider.
These Portals have evolved as the Electronic Healthcare Record has enjoyed greater acceptance and use by providers. You may have used a patient portal yourself, as you have interacted with healthcare providers. They have the potential to increase a patient’s involvement with their own care.
A Personal Healthcare Record, on the other hand, is a place where a person can save all of his or her own healthcare information, in an easily retrievable manner. Some PHRs are online, but a paper PHR could be kept, as well. The Personal Healthcare Record information is completed and created by the individual patient, within the framework that the system allows.
First, visit a PHR site such as one by Microsoft HealthVault, My Doclopedia, or MyHealthFolders. Observe what features are available to the user. Also consider AHIMA’s MyPHR website as a valuable source of information about the PHR.
Next, consider any interactions you may have had so far with a Patient Portal as issue by your own provider. You may also visit sites describing patient portals, such as informational web pages available from HeatlhIT.gov, especially if you have not had personal access to a Patient Portal.
Write a one- to two-page essay comparing and contrasting these methods of a person accessing their own healthcare data. Respond to the following issue and topics as you compare these two methods, PHR versus Patient Portal: