The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is a law that ensures the protection of patient data. Institutions that use patient information must ensure the complete security of medical information about a patient. The HIPAA is placed to ensure complete data privacy; the act enforces companies to take safety measures for protected health information (PHI) and abide by HIPAA compliance.
HIPAA compliance is for every institution that provides treatment, including payments and performing different functions associated with healthcare. It includes businesses directly involved in dealing with patient information, including the fees mentioned in bookkeeping, patient history, and treatment information, which all must be under HIPAA compliance.
HIPAA Privacy and Security
HIPAA, known as the Standards for Privacy for Individually Identifiable Health Information, establishes national standards for protecting certain health information. Similarly, the Security Rule maintains a specific set of standards associated with health information transferred in electronic form. The rule addresses the technical and non-technical safeguards institutions must implement to secure all electronic information about a patient.
The Office of Civil Rights within HHS is responsible for ensuring the data protection of a medical organization. The OCR officer enforces institutions to comply with the Privacy and Security Rules with voluntary compliance, including civil monetary penalties.
Why do Companies Need HIPAA Compliance?
Healthcare institutions and other companies working with Protected Health Information usually move their database from a traditional system to an online-computerized system. An online system includes a computerized physician order entity (CPOE), an electronic health record or EHR, laboratory systems, radiology, and pharmacy.
Today, with so many data breaches by hackers worldwide, compliance with HIPAA is necessary. Medical information is crucial for hospitals and laboratories, but patient information is also helpful for health insurance companies. These companies pay for treatments based on a patient’s health plan. Self-service applications and healthcare management companies must adhere to the HIPAA law; non-compliance with the act would lead to penalties and hefty fines for any data breach.
The Security Rule under the HIPAA policy protects every piece of information about a patient around the U.S. The Security Rule protects patient data while allowing companies to use new and improved technologies to improve patient treatment efficiency. The Security Rule is flexible, allowing an institution or a business to implement different procedures, technologies, and policies to ensure compliance with The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).
HIPAA Compliance with Physical, Technical Safeguards and Policies
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has specific requirements about HIPAA compliance with physical and technical aspects for companies responsible for holding and maintaining sensitive patient information. Some of the physical safeguards associated with compliance with HIPAA are:
- Limited control in handling patient information with authorized access to concerned personnel only
- The organization must implement strict policies to control access to workstations and other computerized information.
- Transferring, disposing of, re-using electronic information, and removing protected health information is restricted.
- Must use unique user IDS, with access codes for emergency access; the database and computers must have an automatic log-off
- Electronic devices must have effective encryption and decryption systems installed.
- Monitoring systems for recording activity on hardware and software are mandatory.
- Auditing reports and tackling logs of every computer system within the institution
Data Protection for Healthcare Institutions and HIPAA
Healthcare organizations must undertake strict safety measures to ensure data security for every patient. Institutions today use high-quality healthcare management systems that meet the demand to meet all security measures The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) puts forward. The rules enforce healthcare organizations to ensure:
- Availability and security of protected health information (PHI) maintain the trust of patients and health care professionals.
- Must maintain HIPAA regulations associated with access, integrity controls, and audits
- Secure data transmissions and device security must be ensured.
- Maintain greater control and visibility of sensitive data in the organization.
- Must guarantee to offer the best security measures to prevent a data breach
- Any structured or unstructured data, including emails, files, reports, and scans, must be protected from cyber-attacks.
- If sharing data with another organization is necessary, both parties must ensure proper security measures before transferring protected patient information.
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) helps maintain a secure way to handle crucial patient information; in case of a data breach by internal or external sources, the organization is investigated thoroughly to protect patient information.
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