HIPAA

HIPAA requires your office protect the confidentiality, integrity and accessibility of patient information. In order to accomplish this, you must address the technical, administrative and physical risks to this information. While offices are making the transition to the cloud, you should not slack off on physical security, including office access controls.

​​​​​​​A roundup of todays HIPAA related news demonstrates that foreign actors such as North Korea and Iran are attacking the US with the latest news having an attack against healthcare and an attack against our political system.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) focuses on protecting the privacy and security of individuals' medical information while also ensuring that people maintain health insurance coverage when changing or losing jobs. HIPAA is divided into five titles, each addressing different aspects of healthcare regulation.

HIPAA has specific rules of who you can share patient information with. Some disclosures are permitted only with patient consent, other disclosures are permitted without consent.

As a medical professional, the initial intention of ‘do no harm’ is treating your patients with the best possible care. However, in this era, our responsibility is that much greater.

As part of the July 4 activities, a hacking group known as ObamaCare posted 9,948,575,739 unencrypted passwords to the internet in a file titled rockyou2024.

Business Associate Agreements are necessary contracts between healthcare providers and Business Associates. Required by HIPAA, the BAA provides protections for your office and the PHI that your office shares with Business Associates.

To keep your network secure, your office must keep your software up-to-date. Software providers will release updates when there is an identified vulnerability. Ransomware such as Blast Basta will take advantage of these vulnerabilities if you do not patch quickly.

There are a number of major changes to HIPAA. The major changes relate to: Public Reporting and Reporting to protect Patients Reporting of patient data related to substance use disorder treatment Reporting of patient data related to reproductive health Updates to the Notice of Privacy Practices and Business Associate Agreement

"The doctors in our practice request patients to text or email them photos of their various foot conditions and post-op P&As to their personal mobile phones. We know this is not HIPAA compliant. What is a better way to handle these situations?"