You have the right to obtain electronic health records from your medical service providers. You also have the right to have your records available to the 3rd party application of your choice.
OtisHealth is a secure Personal Health Record application that complies with federal laws and is designed to help you access all your electronic health records and your protected health information (PHI).Healthcare providers are required by law to provide you with copies of your electronic healthcare records in a portable format any time you request them. They may not charge you a fee for your records. This right is afforded to you as part of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). In HIPAA, your health records are referred to as Protected Health Information (PHI). The US Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) website provides a detailed explanation of this right.
Nearly all healthcare providers in the United States use an Electronic Health Record management system (EHR). These systems are sophisticated and can share health records in different electronic formats. Often, a provider will offer a patient portal that may be used to access the health information in their EHR system. Over the course of a lifetime and over the course of many treatments, our health records can be spread across many different provider EHRs.
To remedy this, the 21st Century Cures Act was passed by the US Congress to encourage the healthcare industry to provide better, patient-focused solutions to simplify our collection of our healthcare information. The Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) is the division of the HHS responsible for implementing the law. The ONC provided a mandate to all healthcare providers and their EHR system vendors that they must comply with the implementation path called ONC’s Cures Act Final Rule. This stipulates that you have the right to have your electronic health records delivered to an application of your choice that is completely unaffiliated with a healthcare provider. These independent applications are known as Personal Health Record systems (PHR).
The ONC website provides a detailed explanation of your rights under this rule.
What ONC’s Cures Act Final Rule Means for Patients (healthit.gov)
