Kathleen Roney of Becker’s Hospital Review recent post 6 Benefits & Challenges in CMS’ Meaningful Use Stage 2 Proposed Rule writes: Another theme within the Stage 2 proposed rule is providing patients with greater access to their health information electronically. According to Dr. Segal, the patient access standard is likely to be a challenge for many providers. “The argument for encouraging patients to access their health information is understandable,” says Dr. Segal. “However, placing the responsibility of whether patients access health information on the providers is a new challenge.”
And finally, HealthAffairs.org in their March 15th post Meaningful Use of Health IT Stage 2: The Broader meaning wrote: It is emphatic that patients be able to access and easily download their healthcare records and images for their own use (through a Patient Portal). This will spawn an industry utilizing this “big data” to provide solutions to patients and providers that help manage care, shop for care, and even invent new models of care delivery.