| Course | NU 725 Technology and Nursing Informatics in Advanced Practice |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 6 |
| Paper type | Access and privacy audit |
| Length | About 670 words, 5 pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Herzing University |
| Program | MSN |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for NU 725 Unit 6
Access and Privacy Audit: Who Can Open Inpatient Psychiatric Unit Records in a General Hospital
Student Name
Department of Nursing, Herzing University
NU 725: Technology and Nursing Informatics in Advanced Practice
Instructor Name
February 24, 2026
Access and Privacy Audit: Who Can Open Inpatient Psychiatric Unit Records in a General Hospital
Scope and Rule Applied
Scope: records of patients admitted to the 18-bed inpatient psychiatric unit of a composite 300-bed general hospital, including psychiatric evaluations, progress notes, nursing notes, and medication records, for the six months of the audit period. The rule applied is the minimum necessary standard of the HIPAA Privacy Rule: a hospital must decide which classes of its workforce need protected health information, restrict each class to what its job requires, and identify the classes of people who need access and the categories of information they need (45 C.F.R. § 164.514(d)). The Security Rule requires audit controls that record activity in systems containing health information and regular review of that activity (45 C.F.R. § 164.312(b); 45 C.F.R. § 164.308(a)(1)). Psychotherapy notes kept separately by a therapist carry additional protection and are excluded here because the hospital does not store them in the shared record.
Role Access Compared With Role Need
Current access was taken from the security configuration of the electronic health record; need was established by interviewing a representative from each role and reviewing job descriptions.
| Role | Current access to psychiatric unit records | Demonstrated need | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Psychiatric unit RNs, psychiatrists, social workers | Full record | Full record for current patients | None |
| All hospital RNs | Full record, any patient | Only when the patient transfers to or from their unit | Excess: broad access to psychiatric notes hospital-wide |
| Emergency department clinicians | Full record | Prior psychiatric history for patients they are treating | Appropriate, but not limited to current patients |
| Registration and scheduling clerks | Demographics and full notes | Demographics and insurance only | Excess: clinical notes |
| Coders and billing staff | Full record | Documentation supporting coding, for discharged patients | Excess for current inpatients |
| Dietitians | Full record | Diet orders, weight, relevant medical history | Excess: psychiatric notes |
| Students and residents on other services | Full record | None unless assigned | Excess |
Findings
Four roles have more access than they need. The largest gap is that every nurse in the hospital can open any psychiatric unit note, because nursing access was configured by role rather than by assignment. This is common: electronic records often grant broad access by default so that clinicians are never blocked in an emergency, and rely on audit to detect misuse rather than on configuration to prevent it (Appari & Johnson, 2010). For psychiatric records, where stigma and harm from disclosure are high, that default is harder to justify.
Emergency Access
The recommendation is to restrict psychiatric unit records to the treating team and to a defined emergency path. When a clinician outside the treating team opens a psychiatric unit record, a break-the-glass screen asks for a reason from a short list, such as "patient in my care, emergency," records the reason, and allows access. Every break-the-glass access is logged and reviewed by the privacy office within seven days. This keeps emergency care unobstructed while making every exception visible and reviewed, rather than an exception nobody tracks.
Log Review Method
Monthly, the privacy office will run a report of all access to psychiatric unit records by users outside the treating team, and review a random sample of 50 access events plus every event meeting a trigger. Triggers for investigation: access to a record of a patient with the same last name or address as the user; access by a user with no clinical relationship to the patient in the past 30 days; access to records of employees who are patients; access to records of a patient in the news; a user opening more than ten psychiatric records in one shift outside their assignment; and any break-the-glass reason that does not match the user's activity. Each investigation is documented, and findings are reported quarterly to the compliance committee.
Role Changes and Departures
Access follows the role, so role changes are a risk. Human resources will notify information services the same day a staff member transfers, and access will be updated within 24 hours; departing staff lose access on their last day. A quarterly review compares active accounts against the current employee list, since the most common audit finding in many hospitals is accounts that remain active after people leave.
Limitations
Interviews covered one representative per role, and some roles may have legitimate needs the interview missed, for example a dietitian caring for a patient with an eating disorder who needs to read the psychiatric assessment. The configuration change will be piloted for one month with a feedback line for staff who are blocked from information they need, and the break-the-glass reasons will be reviewed to see whether any role requires routine rather than emergency access. The informatics perspective here is that access design is a sociotechnical problem: configuration, workflow, and policy must fit together (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2022).
References
Appari, A., & Johnson, M. E. (2010). Information security and privacy in healthcare: Current state of research. International Journal of Internet and Enterprise Management, 6(4), 279-314. https://doi.org/10.1504/IJIEM.2010.035624
45 C.F.R. § 164.308 (2024).
45 C.F.R. § 164.312 (2024).
45 C.F.R. § 164.514 (2024).
McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. G. (2022). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge (5th ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Reading the NU 725 Unit 6 instructions
The Unit 6 assignment asks you to examine privacy, security or confidentiality in a health information system, usually by auditing access or reviewing a policy. Expect to describe the scope, identify the applicable regulations such as HIPAA privacy and security rules, and assess whether current practice meets them. Many versions ask you to compare role-based access with what each role needs, review audit log practices, and recommend changes. Some sections focus on a breach scenario instead. Check how much regulatory citation your section expects; quoting entire rules is rarely needed, but citing the specific sections is. Sensitive records, such as psychiatric or substance use treatment notes, make strong subjects because the stakes are clear. If you use your workplace, describe its configuration without naming the organization.
How the NU 725 Unit 6 example is put together
The audit begins with scope and the rule applied, citing the specific CFR sections for administrative safeguards, technical safeguards and minimum necessary. A table compares access and need role by role, so the gaps can be seen at a glance. The findings section names four roles with more access than needed and explains the biggest one, nursing access set by role rather than assignment. The emergency section answers the obvious objection, that restricting access could delay care, with a break-the-glass screen and a reason requirement. The log review section defines a monthly sample plus specific triggers, such as access to a coworker's record. Role changes get their own short section because access drift is common. Limitations admit that one interview per role may have missed legitimate needs.
Reading the NU 725 Unit 6 rubric
Herzing rubrics for a privacy and security assignment usually award points for the description of scope or scenario, the application of regulations, the analysis of risks or gaps, recommendations, and writing. The regulatory criterion earns full points when the paper cites specific HIPAA provisions accurately and applies them, not when it summarizes the law in general. Analysis points reward specific gaps with their likely consequences. Recommendation criteria look for practical controls, such as break-the-glass access and audit triggers, that match the gaps found. Some rubrics add a criterion for ethical considerations, especially for sensitive records. The writing row covers organization, professional tone and APA 7, including correct legal citation format for the Code of Federal Regulations and scholarly sources such as Appari and Johnson.
NU 725 Unit 6 help: mistakes that cost points
The usual point loss on Unit 6 is a paper that explains HIPAA at length without applying any provision to the system being audited. Another is treating all access as a violation, which ignores legitimate clinical need and emergency care. Students often skip audit logs entirely or say they should be reviewed without defining how often or what triggers a review. Recommendations that rely only on staff training miss technical controls the rubric expects. Citing HIPAA without the specific section numbers is a common gap. Workplace audits sometimes include details that identify the organization, which should be removed. Finally, add a limitations section, because a single interview per role or a short review window affects how far your conclusions reach and graders look for that awareness.
Get a NU 725 Unit 6 example written to your instructions
Send the Unit 6 instructions and the rubric from your NU 725 classroom, plus the record type or department the audit should cover. We write a custom example against those instructions, with the role table, the exception paths and the log method worked out, and return it in 24 to 48 hours. The first one is free.
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NU 725 Unit 6 questions, answered
How much regulation should this document quote?
Enough to establish the requirement and no more, then spend the length applying it. Cite the rule or the organizational policy to its source, state in one sentence what it obliges, and move straight to the role that has to satisfy it. Documents that spend half their length restating requirements usually have no room left for the analysis the rubric is reading for.
What does minimum necessary look like in practice?
It looks like a role reaching the fields its work requires and stopping there. A scheduler needs demographics and appointments rather than clinical notes. A quality analyst may need a diagnosis code without a name attached. Working it out role by role, against actual tasks, produces defensible findings, while quoting the phrase without applying it produces nothing a reader can check.
Can I audit my own workplace for this?
Only in ways your access already permits, and only in what you may write down. Describe roles and permission patterns generically, never reproduce credentials, patient data or internal audit output, and check your employer's rules before examining anything live. A constructed setting described in operational detail earns the same credit and carries none of the exposure.
Where can I find a free NU 725 Unit 6 sample paper?
You can read the complete NU 725 Unit 6 psychiatric records audit on this page for free, from the access table to the log review plan. If your section uses a breach scenario or another record type, a custom paper can follow that brief.
What does minimum necessary mean for nurses' access to records?
It means staff should see only the information needed for their job. In this sample, nurses could open every psychiatric note in the hospital, so the audit recommends limiting access to the treating team with an emergency break-the-glass path.