Understanding Health Information Systems Chapter 3

Flashcards covering key vocabulary terms from the lecture on understanding health information systems and the dynamic healthcare environment, including concepts related to healthcare economics, policy, quality, and technology.

Health Information Systems (HIS)

Systems that play a crucial role in the volatile and dynamic healthcare work environment, essential for the transition to value-based care.

Fee-for-service

A traditional U.S. health system model where providers are reimbursed for individual services, which HIS systems were originally designed to support.

Value-based care

A healthcare model that focuses on improving health outcomes for patients while managing costs effectively, often contrasted with fee-for-service.

Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems

Digital systems used in healthcare that have sometimes led to knowledge-workers spending more time on data entry rather than patient care.

Inadequate quality (in healthcare)

One of the key drivers of change and challenges in the current healthcare state, alongside high costs and an aging population.

To Err Is Human (1999)

A report by the Health and Medicine Division (HMD) that estimated a significant number of patient deaths due to hospital mistakes each year in the U.S.

Crossing the Quality Chasm (2001)

A report by the Health and Medicine Division (HMD) that outlined six key aims necessary to improve the quality of care: safe, effective, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable.

Interoperability

The ability of different healthcare information systems, devices, or applications to access, exchange, integrate, and cooperatively use data to coordinate care, often difficult to achieve in practice.

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA of 1996)

A federal law designed to ensure individuals’ insurance portability and, more significantly, to establish standards for electronic data interchange and privacy/security of protected health information (PHI).

Administrative simplification (HIPAA Title II)

Elements of HIPAA that include electronic HIS standards for data transmission, requirements for Medicare providers, and privacy/security rules for protected health information (PHI).

Protected Health Information (PHI)

Any information about health status, provision of healthcare, or payment for healthcare that is created or collected by a Covered Entity (or a Business Associate of a Covered Entity) and can be linked to an individual.

Population health management

The process of improving clinical health outcomes of a defined group of individuals through improved care coordination and patient engagement, supported by appropriate financial and care models.

Value (in healthcare)

Defined as the ratio of quality or benefits to cost, emphasizing that keeping a person healthy is less costly than managing long-term illness.