Why do people want a paper copy of their electronic patient record?

Abstract

Changes have recently been passed in the Norwegian legislation, allowing for more exchange of patient information between health personnel. These legal changes came as a result of a long and still ongoing debate concerning the potential conflict between confidentiality issues and patient safety as health care is getting more fragmented. At the same time, an increasing number of patients now make use of their legal right to access their patient record. In this paper, we shed light on some of the reasons why patients request a copy of their record. We report the preliminary results from an interview study in which seventeen patients who have asked for a copy of their patient record following a hospital stay have been interviewed. In our interview study, securing transmission of information between health care workers is one of the main reasons for requesting a copy of the record. We will discuss how this finding might contribute to the ongoing debate.