Electronic Health Records and Patient Empowerment in US: from the Legal Perspective

Abstract

Objective: to examine the American electronic health records from a legal perspective. Results: the EHR system presents characteristics from the five aspects: accessibility, coordination, sustained care, decision making, and privacy. Conclusion: The US law in the field of Patient-Centered Health Information Technology has many elements of patient empowerment. There is still a gap between the system is and the system should be. It is found that first, A mandatory adoption of EHR system; second, privacy should be further ensured; and third, the accessibility should be further improved.