The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) of 1996 has helped to revolutionize this country’s use of Patient Health Information (PHI) in many ways, but at the same time it has hindered the American health care system in implementing a national Health Information Exchange (HIE). Consequently, without a national HIE the problem of having a system that allows for continuous quality improvement in the quality of health care received by a patient and still protecting the right to privacy still exists. Additionally, the culture of America views the PHI as being needed to be protecting to the point that it hinders providers from giving good quality care, thus leading the patient to receive double the testing wasting the time
