Are you having trouble accessing your health information?

If you are a consumer, patient, or caregiver and have or are caring for someone with a chronic condition, you probably have or are experiencing some difficulty in trying to access and aggregate your electronic health information across multiple systems. You may have questions such as:

• Who do I talk to at the physician’s office to access my health information?
• What do I tell the provider when I’m requesting my information?
• Is the provider required to give me a copy of my clinical information?
• Can I provide my health information to another third party like an application, another provider, or another organization?

If you are asking these types of questions, we can help.

1. The Office of National Coordinator, which oversees health care technology in the United States, has developed a guide for consumers on how to access their health record. This guide is a great place to start to better understand how to request and use your health information. Please click here for more information.
2. HIPAA And Your Rights to Your Health Information Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) resource with a glossary of terms to help consumers “talk like a pro” when trying to get or share health information.
   • Available in English and Spanish.
   • Interactive Guide to the HIPAA Right of Access.
   • Implementing HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996) can be challenging, especially in a digital ecosystem. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) publishes and continually updates guidance to help people understand individuals’ rights under HIPAA to access their health information, including electronically. This guidance is important for health care providers and administrators, privacy officials, health information management (HIM) professionals and consumers themselves, but can be hard to use. To help make your job easier, GetMyHealthData has reorganized the guidance so you can find, understand and use what you need more efficiently and effectively. OCR’s exact language has been preserved with a link to the original guidance and regulations. Short quizzes for each section will help you test your knowledge along the way.

Is there a form I can use to give to my provider to request my health information?

The professional organization which is responsible for medical records called the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) has developed a form you can download, print, fill out, and take to your physician to request your health information.

You can go here to access the form.

Can I access my health information on my mobile device?

If you have an Apple phone or other iOS device and assuming you know your patient portal username and password, you can access your health records through the Health application on your iPhone.

Learn more by going here.

In the months ahead, we will be providing a list of dozens and dozens of applications that will enable you to compile your clinical information into a single application and provide you with actionable insights to improve your health. Check back for more information!