Patients' Access to Their Psychiatric Records-A Comparison of Four Countries

Abstract

Several Nordic and Baltic countries are forerunners in the digitalization of patient ehealth services and have since long implemented psychiatric records as parts of the ehealth services. There are country-specific differences in what clinical information is offered to patients concerning their online patient accessible psychiatric records. This study explores national differences in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Estonia in patient access to their psychiatric records. Data was collected through a socio-technical data collection template developed during a workshop series and then analyzed in a cross-country comparison focusing on items related to psychiatry records online. The results show that psychiatric records online are offered to patients in all four countries, and provide the same functionality and similar psychiatry information. Overall, the conclusion is that experiences of various functionalities should be scrutinized to promote transparency of psychiatric records as part of the national eHealth services to increase equality of care and patient empowerment.