The Patient Portal

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The Patient Portal: What It Is and Its Benefits Misty Smith June 21, 2014 Elizabeth Sage HCIS/265C The Patient Portal: What It Is and Its Benefits Although electronic records have been around since the sixties, the mandatory adoption of them has only been in effect within the last couple of decades. Along with the electronic health record systems, new and/or advanced or enhanced technologies are bound to follow. One of these advanced technologies is called the patient portal. The patient portal allows communication between consumers and their providers and healthcare organizations to remain open between doctor’s visits. There are many benefits of utilizing a patient portal, capabilities of a patient portal, and how it affects EHR access for consumers, healthcare organizations, and their employees. By the time you reach the end of this paper, you will have complete understanding of everything a patient portal has to offer its consumers and healthcare professionals and organizations. You may be asking yourself, “What is a patient portal and how is it going to benefit me?” The answer is not as complex as you might think. A patient portal is an online application and/or secure website that patients can use as an alternative form of communication between themselves and their provider. Some portals are modules that are added onto an electronic health record system, while others are used as stand-alone websites, and others are integrated into the existing website of a healthcare organization. These applications, modules, or websites are used by the patients of healthcare organizations to gain access to their personal health information. In order to access their personal health information, the individual has to set up a username and password. After they have set up their username and
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