Information Governance: Ensuring Data Security and Responsible Use - Essay Sample

Introduction

Information governance is the measures that are taken by institutions and organizations to ensure the information is secure and used appropriately. The management guides the employees of an organization on how they are supposed to use the information that they access responsibly. The governance entails using caution and securing the information to ensure that only the people that are allowed to access it are the ones with access to the information. The governance ensures that the employees operate in transparency manner and helps the company deal with legal challenges that the organization is likely to get when in conflict because of information related challenges. Some principles guide the users of the information to ensure that the information remains secure.

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Healthcare facilities have a unique environment and challenges when it comes to handling information related to healthcare (American Health Information Management Association, 2014). The information handled in the healthcare facilities is sensitive; therefore there is a need for proper governance of the information. The healthcare facilities should be committed to maintaining the privacy of the information of their clients. Various principles guide the health facilities while they are providing their information to the patients. There are governing principles that guide the health facilities on how to handle information, the principles include.

The principle of accountability is important because it makes the organizations accountable for any information that they have access to. Where the information of a patient of a third party company is linked out, then the organization is made to be responsible for the mess (Ballard, Compert, Jesionowski, Milman, Plants, Rosen, & Smith, 2014). Organizations are forced to adapt governance practices that make the employees use the information for the intended purposes and maintain the privacy of the information. The employees handling certain information within the health facility is responsible for the mishandling of information at the facility. Employees are required to be accountable in terms of how they handle information that they have access to.

The other significant aspect of the governance of information is the transparency on the handling of the information. The changes done to the information should be verifiable to ensure that the information was used for the right purposes (Ballard et al., 2014). Proper governance allows the information to be used transparently. The health facility should be compliant to all government processes and regulations related to the governance of information. The stakeholders of the organization must be able to access their information upon request if need be. Where the employees are transparent on how they are using the information the stakeholders have nothing to worry about.

The other important principle of integrity is the principle of integrity by the people that have access to the information by the organization - integrity in the use of information in a lawful manner to guarantee reliability and authenticity of the information. Integrity makes the handlers of the information use the information only for the intended reasons, and therefore the information cannot be misused (Von Solms, & von Solms, 2006). The employees adhere to the policies and procedures set by the organization concerning the use of information. The employees don't tamper with the information making it reliable during use. Unauthorized personnel is not allowed to access the information to maintain privacy. Integrity makes the information to be reliable because the information has not been interfered with.

Also, there is the principle of protection of information from access of unauthorized persons. The organization is responsible for coming up with strategies and measures to protect the information that the organization has. The information regarding patients and other stakeholders is confidential; therefore it needs to be protected to ensure it does not land to unprotected hands (Juiz, Guerrero, & Lera, 2014). Some of the information handled by health care organizations are private and sensitive; hence in case it lands to unsafe hands can cause an impact to the owner of the information. The protection of the information comes in various forms where the information is protected depending on the sensitivity of the information. Also, there are laws set by the state that are to be followed when protecting and using the information. The medium used to access the information also determines the strategies to be used in securing the information. It's a requirement for the organizations to come up with strategies of securing information.

There is also the principle of availability that ensures that the information is timely, accurate and efficient in terms of retrieval when necessary. Information is stored so that it can be used in the future and therefore the information should be available for use when it's in need (Juiz, Guerrero, & Lera, 2014). The availability is both to the organization and the stakeholders whose information comes from. The right information needs to be available at the right time to ensure that it's used for the purpose that it was intended for. Availability of the information ensures that the information in various activities that take place at the health facility. The information is also updated for future use and to make it more relevant for future use.

There are measures that the organizations need to take in ensuring that the information is available for use by different stakeholders (American Health Information Management Association, 2014). The measures include securing the information from attacks that might influence its availability when in need. There are attacks such as cyber-attacks where the attackers deny accessibility of information when the owners are in need. The organization needs to come up with strategies to ensure that the information is available all the time in need. Among the measures that the health facility organization can take is backing up the information on the cloud for easy access all the time.

Compliance is another principle of governance of information where the organization is required to comply with all the relevant laws and regulations that govern the use of information. The organization is required by law to comply with all the regulations to ensure that are set by the government (Von Solms, & von Solms, 2006). Where the organization does not comply with the law, the organization can be sued for non-compliance. It's a requirement that all the organization maintains certain standards. The regulations ensure that the standards of maintaining data integrity are maintained and data is used for the right purpose.

Conclusion

In conclusion, information governance plays an important role in ensuring that organizations ethically use information. The healthcare organization must protect the information regarding patients and other stakeholders. High standards should always be maintained when it comes to using and maintaining the information standards. Securing the information ensures that the healthcare provider can provide healthcare efficiently because they have the right information regarding the patients. There is also the safety of the stakeholders because information regarding them is not released to unauthorized people that might compromise the security of the stakeholders.

Reference

American Health Information Management Association. (2014). Information Governance Principles for Healthcare (IGPHC).

Ballard, C., Compert, C., Jesionowski, T., Milman, I., Plants, B., Rosen, B., & Smith, H. (2014). Information governance principles and practices for a big data landscape. IBM Redbooks.

Juiz, C., Guerrero, C., & Lera, I. (2014). Implementing good governance principles for the public sector in information technology

Von Solms, R., & von Solms, S. B. (2006). Information Security Governance: a model based on the direct-control cycle. Computers & Security, 25(6), 408-412.