AHIC Clinical Informatics and Patient Care 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A patient uses a wearable device that transmits heart rate data to their provider's EHR. Under HIPAA, this transmitted data is considered:
- Protected Health Information (PHI) (Correct answer)
- De-identified data exempt from HIPAA
- Consumer wellness data outside HIPAA scope
- Research data requiring IRB approval
Correct answer: Protected Health Information (PHI)
When identifiable biometric data is transmitted to a covered entity's EHR for care purposes, it constitutes PHI subject to HIPAA protections.
Question 2: Which metric is MOST relevant when evaluating the impact of a CDS intervention on clinical outcomes?
- Number of alerts generated
- Alert override rate
- Change in the targeted clinical event rate (Correct answer)
- System uptime percentage
Correct answer: Change in the targeted clinical event rate
The ultimate measure of CDS effectiveness is whether the targeted clinical event rate (e.g., hospital-acquired infection, adverse drug event) actually changes.
Question 3: A provider copies and pastes a prior visit note into today's encounter without updating clinical findings. This practice is known as:
- Template-based documentation
- Note bloat or cloning (Correct answer)
- Structured data entry
- Forward documentation
Correct answer: Note bloat or cloning
Cloning or copy-forward documentation creates 'note bloat,' introduces inaccurate or outdated information, and poses patient safety and legal risks.
Question 4: Which HL7 FHIR resource type is used to represent a patient's allergy or intolerance in an interoperable clinical system?
- Condition
- AllergyIntolerance (Correct answer)
- MedicationStatement
- Observation
Correct answer: AllergyIntolerance
The FHIR AllergyIntolerance resource specifically represents patient allergy and intolerance data in a standardized, interoperable format.
Question 5: A clinical informaticist is asked to reduce 30-day hospital readmissions. Which informatics tool is MOST directly applicable?
- Natural language processing of operative reports
- Predictive risk scoring at discharge (Correct answer)
- PACS image compression optimization
- Scheduling system load balancing
Correct answer: Predictive risk scoring at discharge
Predictive risk models at discharge identify high-risk patients who need transitional care interventions to prevent readmission.
Question 6: In clinical informatics, 'information overload' at the point of care is BEST addressed by:
- Displaying all available data by default
- Contextual filtering and prioritization of relevant data (Correct answer)
- Removing data from the EHR to reduce clutter
- Requiring nurses to pre-filter data for physicians
Correct answer: Contextual filtering and prioritization of relevant data
Contextual data filtering and prioritization surfaces the most clinically relevant information for the specific encounter, reducing cognitive burden.
Question 7: Which approach is MOST consistent with the 'five rights' of clinical decision support?
- Delivering all alerts to all users at all times
- Right information, to the right person, in the right format, through the right channel, at the right time (Correct answer)
- Implementing hard stops for all safety-critical decisions
- Using the same CDS rules across all clinical specialties
Correct answer: Right information, to the right person, in the right format, through the right channel, at the right time
The 'five rights' framework for CDS ensures interventions are targeted, timely, and presented appropriately to maximize clinical impact and minimize disruption.
AHIC Clinical Informatics and Patient Care 3
A patient uses a wearable device that transmits heart rate data to their provider's EHR.
Under HIPAA, this transmitted data is considered: