HIPAA, help a collegue's wife

[GetMeOuttaThisMess]

Wife is a dental hygiene faculty member and was asked by a graduate of her program how often patient questionnaires have to be updated?  I told her that this is not an HIPAA item since it has nothing to do with record disclosure or protection.  The answer is that it is left to the discretion of the practice regarding how often they wish to update their records.  Any nay sayers?

 

[primadonna22274]

Nothing to do with HIPAA but most medical practices update them annually. Truth is with EMR the record is being continually updated.

[GetMeOuttaThisMess]

Ka-ching.  I wonder what I can get out of this for giving her the answer?  On a more serious note, it is amazing to me what dental professionals teach students without a thorough understanding of why.  Shh, don't tell her I said this.

[ToppDog]

A lot of practices will only have the patient fill out a full health questionairre as a new patient to that practice, & after that only a review of systems check with each visit.  As Paula said, they may update the info annually, but the patient usually never has to completely redo the questionairre ever again for that same practice... unless the practice is sold & the new owners want their own questionairre filled out :)

[ventana]

Unmeaningful use has this all screwed up

 

I waived out of the bonus and attesting to "meaningful use" as it is just too cumbersome and AAPA let the law get through with out having PAs included with the bonus program so ....... (okay dead horse)

 

 

Anyways - I would think a quick ROS at every visit is prudent - if someone got dx with Afib and put on coumdin you sort of want to know..... so an updated med list too

 

I would do something along the lines of 

 

1) any new medical issues?

2) any trips to the doctors or hospital since our last visit

3) and new meds/allergies

4) anything else new in life?

 

These 4 questions seem short, quick and effective for a dental practice to make sure they are not missing anything in general - before prescribing any meds the DMD best ask their own set of questions....

[SHU-CH]

My dentist updates them annually.

[GetMeOuttaThisMess]

I told her that with regard to HIPAA it didn't matter.  That was the question that they had.  I agree with all above that as to how often to do it depends on the practice.  She didn't just take my word for it, though that doesn't keep her from asking other questions that they run up against.  Apparently she, nor the other faculty, have heard of Google.  I was looking for someone else, like PD so kindly did, to tell her the same thing, which she did.  You don't even want to know how easy those students have it in comparison to traditional PA training, and considering the pay scale, work schedule, and time involved to obtain the training, maybe they're the smarter ones.