Bioethics

A paramount bioethical concern that stresses healthcare managers is the confidentiality of patients and data protection while adopting electronic health records (EHR) and other digital technologies (Basil et al., 2022). Since there is an increased use of electronic medical records, there should also be ways of protecting patients’ information. The issue involves the principles of autonomy, confidentiality, and nonmaleficence. Patients should have control over their personal health information (PHI) and understand the uses and disclosures of the information. A security policy ensures unauthorized individuals cannot disclose or retrieve patient information. Nonmaleficence means that no harm should be caused to the patients as might be occasioned by loss or misuse of their PHI.

Proposed Measures

The management should put adequate security measures in place and clearly outline policies for storing and disposing of data to solve the challenge of data breaches and ensure confidentiality is maintained properly and ethically in a healthcare facility. First, it is necessary to check that all EHR systems and other technologies used in a healthcare facility comply with current legislation, including HIPAA, in the United States. The process involves ensuring that only authorized personnel can access patient data and that data encryption and cybersecurity assessments are enforced to mitigate the effects of cybercriminal activity (Almalawi et al., 2023). Further, strict privacy measures that outline how patients’ information is collected, used, protected, and disclosed should be formulated. Patients should be aware of such policies to know their rights and steps taken to safeguard the information. Recording patients’ permission to use and disclose information can enable the patients to view and provide consent to such use.

Every healthcare provider should be informed of the measures to protect data. Training should be conducted periodically to ensure the staff knows the security measures to be observed while handling patients’ information (Arain et al., 2019). Training is effective in establishing an organizational culture of privacy and security. Additionally, designing an organizational data breach response plan that contains procedures for managing the threat, preventing the spread of the breach, measuring the extent of exposure of patient information, and preventing further damage is recommended. Proper and regular audits and enhancement of data protection should be performed. New risks and technology solutions to improve security features need subscriptions, which are also essential. Periodically asking the patients and healthcare providers working with the EHR systems about possible data confidentiality and protection threats is necessary.