Features CPOE at a Community Hospital: Online Charting Goes Live Maggie Lohnes, RN, CPHIMS, FHIMSS Huntington Hospital in California has an ambitious strategic plan for implementing computer technology to support quality patient care. In Phase II, a team of over 20 nurses and occupational, physical, and respiratory therapists devoted nearly a year of planning for online nursing documentation, with successful results.

Proceedings from the Quality Colloquium
at Harvard University

• Introduction
Barry P. Chaiken, MD, MPH

• Patient Safety: Ethical Considerations
in Policy Development
Nancy Berlinger, PhD, MDiv

• How Online Patient Networks Can Enhance Quality and Reduce Errors
John Lester, BS, Stephanie Prady, BSc, Mac, Yolanda Finegan, BA, and Daniel Hoch, PhD, MD

• P4P Contracting: Bold Leaps or Baby Steps? Alice G. Gosfield, JD

Electronic Records, Patient Confidentiality,
and the Impact of HIPAA
Gail Dudley, DO
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has attempted to protect the privacy of medical records under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Dudley evaluates HIPAA against the challenge that electronic medical records (EMRs) pose to protection of private information. While recognizing EMRs' potential for increasing the quality of healthcare, she is concerned that HIPAA falls short of the privacy protection that EMRs require, but personal information needs more protection than HIPAA currently affords.

Columns

Editor's Notebook
Susan Carr
New Advisors Broaden Board's Focus

Consumers as Partners
Martin J. Hatlie, JD
Consumers and the Patient Safety Movement: Past and Future, Here and There

Technology and Quality
Barry P. Chaiken, MD, MPH
Continuity of Care Record: Foundation for Quality

Public Policy
Dave Roberts, MPA, FHIMSS
View from the Hill: Patient Safety and the 108th Congress

Departments

Pulse
News items from sources worldwide

Trends
New products and services

Calendar

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