Running Head: ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

Ethics in Nursing Informatics

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ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

Ethics in Nursing Informatics

Legal, Financial, and Ethical Issues associated with Legislative Rules in Nursing Informatics
Nursing informatics is the area of expertise that incorporates the science of nursing
with the information and knowledge management contributed from the practice of nursing.
As the term suggests, this requires information accrual, which naturally refers to information
acquired from individual patients in course of their treatment (American Nurses Association,
2015). However, in todays world of technology, when patient records are maintained
electronically, there is a fear that patients sensitive and private information might be misused
or made public, without the patients consent. Thus, the idea of having a national center that
has Electronic Health Record (EHR) of several people has been caused conflict and
controversy over privacy concerns (American Nurses Association, 2015). The Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which was introduced in 1996 is
known to almost all nurses in the United States. It is meant to ensure that the patient data or
information that has been a part of healthcare worker, nurse, or doctor and patient interaction
remains confidential. Such information is accessible to only the patient or doctors and other
medical workers with the patients consent and to the legal system, is the law rules that the
information is essential for security purposes. The Patient Safety and Quality Improvement
Act of 2005 (PSQIA) institutes provisions for data security and patient privacy as well as
confidentiality and breach notifications.
It is essential for healthcare centers and hospitals to have a proper encrypted system
with auditing software that safeguards the patient information (American Nurses Association,
2015). In addition, they must also inform patients about their right to privacy (American
Nurses Association, 2015). HIPAA and PSQIA are indeed essential to ensure that the
healthcare workers do not cross boundaries in their quest of science or for their personal need

ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

and in the process, harm patients interests. For instance, According to Privacy Rights
Clearinghouse (2015), a non-profit organization that works to ensure consumer protection
and awareness in the society, in the last 10 years, 4,608 security breaches in the healthcare
system has caused in the breaching of 868,403,517 patient records. However, many
healthcare workers, in spite of their awareness of these legislative legalities, do not
understand their implications. The fact remains that the seemingly regular act of collecting
patient data and using it in a healthcare setup, something that should ideally be considered
secondary to the actual healthcare provided, can cost a healthcare setup millions, when a
small error is made or when some small accident occurs. Hospitals and healthcare centers
become liable to pay millions of dollars, when patient information is mishandled.
The HIPAA also protects the patients by ensuring that their private information is not
used for commercial purposes (Croll, 2010). Today, almost all industries make their customer
information available to retailers, so that the trends in consumption can be used for
manufacturing, marketing and sales. Naturally, the information available for medical
purposes is sensitive data that cannot be simply made available to retailers in the medical
business. However, companies are always seeking such information, and nurses can become
easy targets if they unknowingly make patient information available for non-health or
marketing reasons. Consequently, all nurses need to be trained in nursing informatics, such
that they can utilize and safeguard the data available to them diligently and ethically.
The Barriers Presented by the Legislative Legalities in Successful Organizational
Implementation
There are several hurdles caused by the HIPAA and PSQIA regulations in healthcare
organizations. For instance, a nurse cannot simply view patient information to satisfy his or
her scientific, professional curiosity. Nurses must meet several legal requirements, which

ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

include their background and credentialing and licensing status (Croll, 2010). This could
inhibit the nurses educational growth. Moreover, nurses, as the first and constant point of
contact with the patients, are often required to maintain a relationship with the patient, based
on their knowledge of the patient. When such nurses have limited information, they can be
limited in the services they offer as well. This cannot reflect well on the healthcare
organization in the long term. In addition, the healthcare setting is such that patients and their
families and friends are often emotional and aggravated with stress. The patients can also be
suspicious of the quality of care provided to them, simply because they do not trust the
system. This can lead to their refusal to provide access to minimum healthcare workers,
which can make the workplace environment difficult for the nurses, who require access to
patient formation to do their jobs well. Again, in the long term, any problems caused by such
a situation do not reflect well upon the organization. Finally, the financial costs of any issues
with EHR handling can cause the organization to run significant losses, and such costs are
inevitable, because a foolproof EHR system has not been established yet (Croll, 2010; Hjort,
2007). A well-known example is the public declaration of the Department of Veterans Affairs,
believed to have an exception EHR system as well as an Tele-health system, regarding
several unintentional security failures.
The Methods for Health Care Organizations to make the most of their EHR investments in a
Meaningful Manner
The best step, given the aforementioned situation, is to invest in securing patient data,
rather than pay financially for it, even potentially losing reputation over it. Human, natural,
and technological threats must be evaluated regularly to ensure that security breaches do not
occur. In todays date, it has become essential for healthcare centers and hospitals to invest in
a sound technology along with adept technical personnel, thus ensuring reliable and alert data
collection and security.

The escalating obstacles presented by constantly changing

ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

legislations, ethics and the medical arena has be foresee if healthcare organizations intend to
avoid pressing problems in the future. Nursing informaticists are required to find a sense of
equilibrium in dealing with the straightforward access that digital record maintenance
provides with the requirement for patient privacy and confidentiality.
How EHR-related meaningful use legislation is implemented in the authors organization
The organization, for which the author of this paper works, ensures that the nursing
staff is well informed and educated about the intricacies of the subject, that is, nursing
informatics. It provides training as well as education, which equips all nurses with the
awareness and skills necessary to identify, infer, evaluate, and theorize using patient data. In
fact, incomplete data logs, with missing identifiers as well as absent private information can
be sensitively handled and utilized by the nursing staff here. The organization also has the
best data safeguarding system in the market today. In addition, it invests in a technology cell,
which works towards upgrading the system, which shows its cautious and dedicated approach
to safeguarding patient data. Finally, it also provides education aid for nurses interested in
having a career in informatics.

ETHICS IN NURSING INFORMATICS

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References

American Nurses Association.(2015). Ethics in Nursing Informatics, pp. 4952. In Nursing

informatics: Scope and standards of practice (2nd ed.). Silver Spring, MD: American
Nurses Association.
Croll, P. (2010). Privacy, security and access with sensitive health information. Studies in
Health Technology and Informatics 151, 167175. Retrieved on September 23, 2015
from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20407159.
Hjort, B. (2007). AHIMA report addresses evolving role of health care privacy and security
officers. Journal of Health Care Compliance 9(3), 4768.
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. (2015). Chronology of Data Breaches. Referenced on
September 23, 2015 from https://www.privacyrights.org/data-breach/new.