What are the Benefits and Flaws of Having Your Medical Records Stored Online

1537

Sometimes technology can be our most powerful tool and sometimes it can be our greatest weakness, if we do not know how to operate it in a safe way.

Technology enabled us the internet and with the help of the internet and its tools our lives became much more organized.

From learning remotely to storing our medical records, doing things online is being more and more integrated in society.

It’s not just how we do things, but also, where we keep the important files.

For example, keeping important documents on the cloud is more and more common.

From high school degrees and personal contacts all the way to medical records and work permits, all of these documents are stored online, and it’s normal.

Comparing to the old ways, the modern toolkit enables us to live far less stressful lives.

And yet, stress is on the rise, but that’s another topic for discussion.

In this article we will talk about the benefits and potential flaws of having your med records stored online with aim to show you how to use these modern tools to be more organized and less stressed.

Ok, so let’s define it first. What are EHR, or Electronic Health Records?

Electronic health records are defined as an electronic version of the medical history of a certain patient.

These records are kept by the medical health care professionals for some period of time.

All of the vital administrative data like progress reports, medications, problems, certain illness history, laboratory data, radiology reports, immunization reports, and demographics are found inside the medical history document.

Since the old days are far gone, and new technology has taken its place in the world, it is becoming more and more popular and possible to keep all relevant medical records online which provides many benefits to patients, physicians as well as healthcare services which have adopted this type of practice.

If you want to organize and secure your important medical records online, and yet, you do not know where to start and are not aware of what to do, this article will be more than useful.

What are the Benefits and Flaws of Keeping Med Records Online?

benefits-and-flaws-of-having-your-medical-records-stored-online

The primary benefit of online storage is convenience and efficiency.

Medical facilities are improving their effectiveness or their operation thanks to this modern solution for archiving important patient data in the central storage base.

Compared to the old fashioned way, it is much quicker to store digital files than those made out of paper.

By giving access to your online medical records through an online database, you will also allow specialists to view your files and share them.

Having as many different opinions as possible on your condition is more than beneficial, for example, the chances of treating any condition you have successfully are much higher.

Another big benefit is safety.

Also, as a result, you will keep your medical records digitally secure unlike physical files in a few different ways.

The First would be that the paper can be easily lost, stolen, or even damaged.

Since the traditional record system is complicated it may take time for staff to actually find your medical data.

The risk of something like that happening online is minimal.

Backups are usually created each day, depending of course on the solution you chose to store and manage your records.

Some systems might even allow you to store older versions of files which will allow the medical staff to recreate the existing data in case of any errors.

Big benefit is security.

In the healthcare sector, the cybersecurity market is constantly growing and evolving so it could be protected from possible threats.

Regular IT risk assessments are required in order to keep up with the advancement of the attackers and to ensure that your ever evolving IT surroundings keep the same level of security.

Firstly, you would need to evaluate which threats are facing your electronic health records and to assess the areas which might be most vulnerable.

Also, it would be wise to organize and identify your files based on risk and to take action against potential danger.

In order to ensure all that, it would be advised to have your IT environment one step in front of the threat.

It is not enough to perform assessments once a year, it would be wise to perform IT estimates as frequently as possible.

The most effective technique to keep your records safe is to keep, maintain up to date, and fully patch the software environment which you use.

The biggest flaw can be the opportunity to hackers to exploit your records.

Often, when having medical documents online, it is possible to store and process a huge amount of data which is unnecessary while organizing.

There are few cases where people cannot access their Medical records and even less cases where those records were stolen.

All the records that are kept online commonly representing a huge opportunity to hackers. But as technology advances things become more and more secure. But you should also know how to protect yourself.

It would be wise to regularly delete anything which is unnecessary in your medical data for the sake of your security according to many compliance regulations, including HIPAA’s.

The general rule would be to constantly classify your files and separate sensitive records from those which should be removed.

By keeping your medical documents which are stored online clean, you will drastically reduce the risk of hackers breaching in.

What Should You Do If You Want to Be More Secure:

The thing is you cannot be ultimately secure. There will always be some risk because we live in a world that’s uncertain.

There are many variables we don’t know of and many things we have no control over.

However, this should not stop us from aiming to be as secure as we can possibly be when it comes to important things, like medical papers.

If you want to educate yourself more you can speak to a professional in that field, ask them what’s the safest way to keep the database in check.

You can search the internet, ask people with experience and ask advice from friends to tell you how they deal with keeping their records in check.

We hope that with this article you will feel less paranoid about modern technology, at least to a degree, and be inspired to learn how to use these tools for your benefit.

SHARE
I help people upgrade their Spirit, Mind, Body, Heart to become the best version of themselves! After 10 years of writing, coaching and collaborating with top coaches from all around the world I have learned the best secrets to help you unleash your full potential! You can be a Superhuman! Write me at [email protected] if you have any direct question! Much Love!