What Is HIPAA?
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is a set of regulatory standards that outlines the legitimate use and disclosure of sensitive patient data. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regulates HIPAA and the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) enforces it.
The purpose of HIPAA is to protect the privacy, security, and integrity of protected health information (PHI), which is any demographic information that can be used to identify a patient or client.
Who Must Comply With HIPAA?
HIPAA regulation applies to any organization that creates, collects, or transmits PHI electronically as well as those organizations that handle or encounter that transmitted information. HIPAA regulation identifies two types of organizations that need to be compliant:
Covered Entities
Covered entities include health care providers, health care clearinghouses, health insurance providers, etc.
Business Associates
The term business associated has a wide scope and includes any service providers that may handle, transmit, or process PHI. For example, billing companies, EHR platforms, cloud storage providers, email hosting services, third-party consultants, etc.
What Are The HIPAA Requirements?
HIPAA compliance requires covered entities and business associates to adhere to a set of national standards that govern the use and disclosure of PHI. Compliant organizations are required to :
Conduct annual audits to access gaps in compliance with HIPAA regulations.
Establish plans to remedy compliance violations.
Develop policies and procedures corresponding to HIPAA regulatory standards, regularly update them as well as train employees on these policies and procedures.
Maintain documentation.
Review and manage business associate agreements to mitigate liability.
Establish an incident management process.
How Jones IT Helps You WITH HIPAA Compliance?
Physical and Technical Safeguards
In order to safeguard electronic patient health information, we can implement a variety of solutions including facility access control, device access control, encryption, firewalls, mobile device management (MDM), automatic log off, etc.
Policies, Procedures, And Documentation
You will need to create and regularly update your policies and procedures to keep your operations as well as your workforce compliant with regulations. Also, through documentation helps you establish the normal band of operations and will enable you to flag any deviation in your operations. This will be a critical resource in your internal as well as external audits.
Network Security
Protecting your IT infrastructure from cyberattacks is critical for HIPAA compliance. We will protect your company’s IT infrastructure against malware, phishing, Trojans, and unauthorized remote access. We will secure your network against the common computer network-related attacks and mitigate the risks associated with business networks.
Cloud Backup And Data Recovery
Not only is your clients’ data subject to HIPAA regulations, it is also the most critical resource for your business. Loss of data causes long-term damage to your reputation and your clients may never be able to trust you again. However, this is completely preventable. We will build a robust data backup and recovery plan to ensure that your data is always secure. With our data security plan in place, your business will be compliant with all the relevant regulatory requirements.
WHAT ARE THE HIPAA RULES?
HIPAA requirements are divided into several major standards or rules, which are as follows:
1. PRIVACY RULE
The HIPAA privacy rule furnishes directives intended for the protection and privacy of the patients’ health information.
2. SECURITY RULE
The Security Rule establishes a set of security standards intended to protect the health information, which is held or transferred in electronic form (ePHI).
The Security Rule lays down three types of safeguards:
Administrative
Physical, and
Technical
3. TRANSACTIONS AND CODE SETS (TCS) RULE
The HIPAA Transactions and Code Sets Rule is intended to simplify the processes related to payment for healthcare services.
4. UNIQUE IDENTIFIERS RULE
The Unique Identifiers Rule requires all covered entities to use a unique 10 digit National Provider Identifier (NPI) for identification purposes.
5. BREACH NOTIFICATION RULE
The set of standards that covered entities and business associates are required to follow, in case of a data breach containing PHI or ePHI, is covered by the Breach Notification Rule.
6. OMNIBUS FINAL RULE
The Omnibus Final Rule requires the business associates of covered entities to be HIPAA compliant.
7. HITECH ACT
The HITECH Act was implemented to encourage the adoption of electronic health records among healthcare providers and to improve the privacy and security of healthcare data.
Subtitle D of the HITECH Act deals with the privacy, security, and breach notification requirements in relation to electronic transmission of health information and strengthens the civil and criminal enforcement of the HIPAA regulation.
HIPAA compliance standards can be overwhelming and if you have to deal with all the technical aspects of it, it can be an absolute nightmare. Given the complex matrix that technical infrastructure, cloud storage, third-party applications, and compliance requirements create, having a trusted technology partner is essential to ensure your practice remains secure and compliant. By partnering with Jones IT, rest assured, your organization will no longer be exposed to the risks associated with IT that's not HIPAA compliant.
