edgeMED Help Center > Electronic Health Records > EHR

Limit PHI access to a patient's care team.

When to Limit Access to Patients

If you work with a large number of physicians, or you have physicians from multiple locations that shouldn't be able to see patient health information (PHI) for certain patients or locations, it may make sense for you to limit a patient's PHI availability. This feature is available so that you can conveniently leverage all of the great options and connectivity that edgeMED offers, without having to compromise on patient care and patient information security.

Combine this feature with consent forms or intake forms to make this even easier! Use edgeMED's consent forms to easily disclose PHI policies to your patients and our intake forms to find out how a patient wants their PHI to be limited.

Who Can View PHI

Patient data in Electronic Health Records (EHR) and ePrescribing (eRx) includes a patient's demographics, medications, encounters, labs, and other documents and details saved to the patient's dashboard. By default, patient data is accessible by all providers and staff in a practice. This includes users across multiple locations set up for the practice.

When PHI is limited for a patient, the specified providers (care team) are able to view all of a patient's data. Additionally, staff will only be able to view a patient's data when they are working for ('Writing As') a provider that is on the patient's care team. All staff and providers that are not on the patient's care team will only be able to access the patient's basic demographics.

  What is considered basic patient demographics?

  • Patient's full name
  • Patient photo (if added)
  • Chart number
  • Social security number (if added)
  • Date of birth
  • Address
  • Email address
  • Phone numbers
  • Communication preferences
  • Gender
  • Gender identity
  • Sexual orientation
  • Race
  • Ethnicity
  • Preferred language
  • Marital status
  • Employment status
  • Date and cause of death (if patient is deceased)
  • Patient flags (if added)
  • Insurance information (if added)
  • Referring provider
  • Preferred provider
  • PHI restriction status
  • Favorite pharmacies
  • Next of kin information (if added)

Limit Access to Patient PHI

Your account will need to have permission to view a patient's PHI in order for you to update access to it.

Navigate to the Patient Dashboard for the appropriate patient and click on the patient's name.


Navigate to the Patient Dashboard for the appropriate patient and click on the patient's name.

 
Scroll to the bottom of the demographic window and choose from the following PHI restrictions: All practice providers and staff: All providers and staff can view this patient's PHI. Preferred provider only: Only the preferred provider, and staff working for the preferred provider, can view this patient's PHI. Preferred provider and selected care team members: A group of specified providers, and staff working for those providers, can view this patient's PHI.Click Update to save the patient's settings.


Scroll to the bottom of the demographic window and choose from the following PHI restrictions:

  •  All practice providers and staff: All providers and staff can view this patient's PHI.

  •  Preferred provider only: Only the preferred provider, and staff working for the preferred provider, can view this patient's PHI.

  •  Preferred provider and selected care team members: A group of specified providers, and staff working for those providers, can view this patient's PHI.

Click Update to save the patient's settings.

Assign a Patient's Care Team

Set a patient's preferred using the dropdown for Preferred Provider in the patient demographics window.


Set a patient's preferred using the dropdown for Preferred Provider in the patient demographics window.

 
Assign a patient's full care team once PHI has been restricted to "all active providers under this entity." Select the checkbox for the patient's care team from the dropdown below this PHI option.Click Update to save any changes to the pa…


Assign a patient's full care team once PHI has been restricted to "all active providers under this entity." Select the checkbox for the patient's care team from the dropdown below this PHI option.

Click Update to save any changes to the patient's settings.

Once you click Update, You are prompted to click Confirm to attest that the patient has expressed consent to the changes in their chart restrictions.

 


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