Patient Overview

You probably receive medical care from a variety of providers, including doctors in private practice, hospitals, clinics, nursing homes and home care agencies. Each provider keeps its own medical record about you, including information about which medicines you use and which tests you have had.

If your health care providers can share this information with one another, they can provide you with better care – especially in an emergency. Giving your providers a better picture of your medical history helps them make the most accurate diagnosis and prescribe the best treatment. For example, if your doctor can check BHIX to learn about the current medications you are taking, he/she can avoid harmful drug-to-drug interactions even if you forget to tell your doctor about those medications.

Privacy Protections are of critical importance.  As a patient, you have the right to control whether any BHIX Participant (e.g. hospital, nursing home, home care agency) can routinely access your medical information. You will choose whether to allow a Participant to access to your medical information after being informed of what BHIX can do for you. In order to allow access to your medical information, indicate that you Give Consent on the Patient Consent Form

A growing number of Participants are taking part in BHIX. To learn if the place where you receive care is a part of BHIX, please see our list of Participants. As a healthcare consumer, you may want to encourage your health care providers to learn more about BHIX if he/she is not yet a Participant.

Information accessed through BHIX comes from an expanding list of Health Information Sources which will include Participants, other health care providers (such as doctors, pharmacies and clinical laboratories) health insurers and other health information exchanges. 

• patient demographic information
• advance directive information
• physician/primary contact information
• allergies
• medications
• problem lists and diagnoses
• procedures