...THE HEALTH INSURACE PORTABILITY AND ACCOUNTABILITY ACT (HIPAA) Abstract This paper will explain what HIPAA is, a brief history and background of it; why it is so important, what are the rules, who is protected, who needs to follow the rules and who does not, who can see the patent information, and what kind of right the patent has. In general, this paper will cover and the importance of HIPAA, and the impacts that have on consumers and providers. This paper examines Mark A. Rothstein (2013) The Federal Register published the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) omnibus amendments to the Health Insurance Portability Act (HIPAA) Privacy, security, Enforcement, and Breach Notification Keywords: HIPAA privacy and security of health care records. THE HEALTH INSURANCE PORTABILITY AND ACCOUNTABILITY ACT (HIPAA) Understanding HIPAA What is HIPAA? Department of health defined HIPAA as the federal Health insurance portability and accountability act. The objective is to make it easier for people to keep health insurance, protect the confidentiality and security of healthcare information and help the health care industry control administrative cost. HIPAA is written in 1996, enacted in April 14, 2001 and mandated in April 15, 2003. HIPAA is composed of two main rules; The HIPAA privacy rule and The HIPAA security rule. The HIPAA privacy rule provides for the privacy of individual’s personally identifiable health...
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...Smith Independence University HCA 542A Mod 11:2011 8wk-online Final Paper October 10, 2011 HIPPA This paper will begin with a brief background and history on the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Following the background will be details about issues that are address within the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. The purpose of this paper is to provide a foundation with providing some information about HIPAA. Background The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was enacted by Congress in 1996 in response to several issues facing health care coverage, privacy, security and fraud in the United States (ALL THINGS MEDICAL BILLING, 2011, para. 2). Before HIPAA, rules and regulations varied by state, there was no real consistency. Also, there was confusion as to which regulations were applicable and to whom. Did the rules apply in the states where the organization was doing business or where the organization was based? There was also no uniformity between state and federal requirements (ALL THINGS MEDICAL BILLING, 2011, para. 3). With regard to privacy, there were numerous uncoordinated federal acts which addressed privacy in some form. Prior to HIPAA, there was no standard authority for enforcement of fraud and abuse that applied to state and federal health care programs (ALL THINGS MEDICAL BILLING, 2011, para. 4). Congress recognized the increased use of electronic...
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... Sandie Hood University Of Phoenix A current law that impacts the delivery of human service is the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act. HIPAA is an acronym for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. HIPAA is a law, which protects the privacy of individually identifiable health information. The HIPAA has rules and standards that help keep a patient‘s information private and safe. What reliable resources are available to learn about the implications of this law? Many reliable resources are available to help one learn more about this law. One can go to the HIPAA or the Human services website and find information on this law. One needs to know how to understand the health information. HIPAA provides a federal protection about patients information help by covered entities and gives patient’s the rights and respect to the information. Administrative, physical, and technical safeguards covered entities to ensure that the confidentiality, integrity of the patient health information is protected. The covered entities are one’s local doctor offices, clinics, dentist, pharmacies, chiropractors, and Nursing Homes. The purpose or rationale of this law is to improve efficiency in health care delivery, protection of confidentiality, and security of health information by setting and enforcing standards. This helps to keep the patient medical history private between...
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...The history of HIPAA began August 21, 1996. Congress enacted the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). It required the HHS or (Health and Human Services) recommend standards protecting the privacy of individuals health information by August 21, 1997. With HIPPA coming into law in 1996 it came with a promise and sweeping changes in the management and operation of security for healthcare organizations. The main purpose of HIPAA was to mandate healthcare information and enable it to be uniform my utilizing electronic transactions. Since the primary purpose of HIPAA was to allow healthcare to become portable (meaning a patient can have access to their medical records anywhere and anyplace at anytime) with the utilization of electronic medical records. In order for this to take place medical records have to be protected better than it once was. It is also necessary to protect the same information with rules of how the information would be secured and safeguarded. HIPAA rules are separated into four sections; administrative safeguards, physical safeguards, security services and security mechanisms. Administrative safeguards handle those policies, procedures, and practices that are used by an entity to handle protected health information. This is handled by policies and procedures that are used in the normal day to day operation of any practice. Physical safeguards are security measures to handle physical access to any data in the facility. Meaning...
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...A current law that impacts the delivery of human service is the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act. HIPAA is an acronym for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. HIPAA is a law, which protects the privacy of individually identifiable health information. The HIPAA has rules and standards that help keep a patient‘s information private and safe. What reliable resources are available to learn about the implications of this law? Many reliable resources are available to help one learn more about this law. One can go to the HIPAA or the Human services website and find information on this law. One needs to know how to understand the health information. HIPAA provides a federal protection about patients information help by covered entities and gives patient’s the rights and respect to the information. Administrative, physical, and technical safeguards covered entities to ensure that the confidentiality, integrity of the patient health information is protected. The covered entities are one’s local doctor offices, clinics, dentist, pharmacies, chiropractors, and Nursing Homes. The purpose or rationale of this law is to improve efficiency in health care delivery, protection of confidentiality, and security of health information by setting and enforcing standards. This helps to keep the patient medical history private between the healthcare providers and patient. This means that no one can call and request the patient records without the patient’s permission...
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...organization affiliated with health service. HIPPA Privacy Rule made it possible for all patients to see, copy and request to amend their own medical records. It provides federal protection for patient’s health information. With the Privacy Rule patients must be notify about who their medical information is disclosed to. Patients can also find out who access their medical records for the prior six years. Under the HIPPA Privacy Rule only minimum information should be disclosed to accomplish the intended purpose and a complaint can be filed if there is a violation of privacy. The Privacy Rule only applies to health plans, health care clearinghouses, and to any health care provider who transmits health information in electronic form in connection with transactions for which the Secretary of Health and Human Services has adopted standards under HIPAA. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, was enacted on August 21, 1996. Sections 261 through 264 of HIPAA require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to publicize standards for the electronic exchange, privacy and security of health information. The Privacy Rule set a national standard for the protection of certain health information. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued the Privacy Rule to implement the requirement of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. The...
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...business and used for business purposes, as well as can be used for legal purposes, as it is presumed trustworthy. The Legal Health Record should also maintain any decisions make regarding the patient’s care, and the revenue needed by third-party payers. The general considerations when dealing with any format of a legal health record includes: purpose of record, compliance with laws and regulations, documentation, and rules of evidence. Also, much like paper legal health records, the considerations for electronic legal health records include: length of storage cost of storage, long-term usefulness, and long-term efficiency. When discussing one of the general considerations of the Legal Health Record, there are a few laws and regulations that come to mind such as HIPAA and how it defines a designated record set, which is different from the Legal Health Record. HIPAA’s privacy rule defines the designated record set as “a group of records maintained by or for a covered entity that may include patient medical and billing records; the enrollment, payment, claims, adjudication, and cases or medical management record systems maintained by or for a health plan; or information used in whole or part to make care-related decisions.” (AHIMA, 2011). The designated record set is covers more information about the patient, as it contains all protected health information, while the legal health record focuses on information related to patient care. According to HIPAA, the designated record set...
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...Gwendolyn Bradley Hsm/230 2/22/14 Marcella Dowdell The impact of HIPAA on the delivery of human services! I have been a medical assistant for 15 years and HIPAA is a regulation/law that I have had to read over and over again. HIPAA stands for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, this act was passed in 1996 two year after that I became a medical assistant. HIPAA requires the United States health and human services to issue rules protecting the privacy of medical information. This information can be found on the Health and Human Service website. www.hhs.gov The HIPAA privacy rules were issued by the HHS to cover a number of types of companies and can affect human service organizations as health care providers, business associates or employers. The purpose of the rational of this act is to prevent any human service organization covered by the rule from sharing personal medical information without removing all details that could be used to identify the person . For example, a doctor's office that put a patient's name and medical history up on its website would be in violation of the rule or if a nurse is having a conversation with a co- worker about a patient and she shares all the patients personal information. The companies covered include any organization or person that shares medical information electronically for purposes such as authorizing benefits or medical referrals. This can include health insurance plans, health...
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...society as a whole (Austin & Boxerman, 2008). Discuss the impacts of breach to Healthcare Information systems, especially the financial and privacy impacts. Some of the most devastating security breaches can occur during employee termination when steps are not taken to remove access to resources in a timely manner. HIPAA guidelines specify that when employees are terminated, that certain steps, at a minimum, must be followed. These include changing locks, removal from access lists, removal of user account, and confiscation of keys, tokens and other access cards. Though these steps may seem to be common sense, some organizations may not have documented procedures to follow when an employee is terminated. Additionally, the responsibility for carrying out the termination procedures must be clearly assigned and documented (SANS Institute, 2001). Security Training In order for a security program to work well, the employees must be educated insecurity practices such as password protection, monitoring login failures and other basic practices. A well-educated workforce can become an extension of the security group of any organization through simple awareness. The HIPAA regulations require a Security Awareness training program that includes: awareness training for all personnel, security reminders to the workforce, virus...
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...Administrative Ethics Paper By William Keyser HCS/335 4-26-11 Susan Morgan When developing an effective strategy and rewards compensation plan one must produce a policy that executes the plan successfully. The Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) laws allows the human resources professionals to hire the high qualified staff by selecting the right candidates for interviews, and giving the best job offers without discriminating against any candidates. Affirmative Action prevents discrimination among race, creed, religion, and sex. According to State of South Carolina (2009), “Affirmative action is an effort to develop a systematic approach to eliminate the current and lingering effects of prior discrimination. It is a race and sex conscious effort to achieve equal employment opportunity for all race sex groups in a workforce. Then with the Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) it prohibits specific types of job discrimination in certain workplaces, and they are a independent federal...
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...Administrative Ethics Paper Alyssa Jane Marie Cunningham HCS/335 January 16, 2011 Sonja Allen Administrative Ethics Paper When developing an effective strategy and rewards compensation plan one must produce a policy that executes the plan successfully. The Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) laws allows the human resources professionals to hire the high qualified staff by selecting the right candidates for interviews, and giving the best job offers without discriminating against any candidates. Affirmative Action prevents discrimination among race, creed, religion, and sex. According to State of South Carolina (2009), “Affirmative action is an effort to develop a systematic approach to eliminate the current and lingering effects of prior discrimination. It is a race and sex conscious effort to achieve equal employment opportunity for all race sex groups in a workforce” (p. 1). According to the United States Department of Labor (2009), “The Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) prohibits specific types of job discrimination in certain workplaces. EEOC is an independent federal agency that promotes equal opportunity in employment through administrative and judicial enforcement of the federal civil rights laws and through education and technical assistance. EEOC protects applicants and employees of many private employers, state and local governments, educational institutions, employment agencies...
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...Administrative Ethics Paper Shannon Carpenter HCS/335 February 16, 2015 Administrative Ethics Paper When developing an effective strategy and rewards compensation plan one must produce a policy that executes the plan successfully. The Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) laws allows the human resources professionals to hire the high qualified staff by selecting the right candidates for interviews, and giving the best job offers without discriminating against any candidates. Affirmative Action prevents discrimination among race, creed, religion, and sex. According to State of South Carolina (2009), “Affirmative action is an effort to develop a systematic approach to eliminate the current and lingering effects of prior discrimination. It is a race and sex conscious effort to achieve equal employment opportunity for all race sex groups in a workforce” (p. 1). According to the United States Department of Labor (2009), “The Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) prohibits specific types of job discrimination in certain workplaces. EEOC is an independent federal agency that promotes equal opportunity in employment through administrative and judicial enforcement of the federal civil rights laws and through education and technical assistance. EEOC protects applicants and employees of many private employers, state and local governments, educational institutions, employment agencies, and labor organizations...
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...Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) A shadow chart (not part of the legal medical record) is a copy of original health record retained apart from the primary custodial area used primary by health care providers in their office or clinic setting. Independent databases are often created by researchers and may not include the same content as the original health record. In case of a late entry (addendum) in one, shadow chart or independent database, that is used to add information to a previous entry must have the title addendum, date, time, the reasons of creating the addendum referring back to the original entry (Legal Medical Records Standards). Information technology staff can help decrease incidents of security breaches by implementing screen protectors in all computers, by providing logging accreditation to all personnel, by using network security software and hardware, by monitoring the safety of the network and by educating, reporting and enforcing any HIPAA violation. In case of disclosure of unauthorized protected medical information such as providing a copy of medical records to a friend of a patient without written authorization from the patient may result in fines and imprisonment to the institution and individuals involved in such HIPAA violation. HIPAA defines as criminal the use or disclosure (by individuals or institutions) of confidential medical information of a patient for any other purposes than treatment, payment, or health care operations...
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...Act, HIPAA. For the purpose of the exercise, this document will examine a typical visit to the doctor’s office. The focus will be to identify the various organizational, administrative, physical and technical safeguards that a doctor’s office should have in place to protect protected health information (PHI) as well as provide guidance in needed areas for compliance. In particular, the paper’s focus pinpoints the ePHI although all health information, written and oral should be addressed with HIPAA. The importance of protecting the confidentiality of patient information requires a synergy of effort from IT, management and staff. Purpose The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was passed by Congress in 1996 and deals with security of healthcare information (HIPAA Administrative Simplification Statute and Rules, n.d.). The HIPAA regulations apply to health care providers who transmit any health information electronically, health plans (including Medicare and Medicaid programs), health care clearinghouses and healthcare business associates (Unknown, 2013). HIPAA defines a health care provider as a provider of medical or health services or any other person or organization who furnishes, bills, or is paid for health care in the normal course of business (Unknown, 2013). The intention is to protect the individual’s privacy and confidentiality throughout the gathering, transmitting and storing of healthcare information. The various components of HIPAA cover...
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...Administrative Ethics Administrative ethics is essential to developing a rewarding compensation plan that produces strategies within a policy effectively to execute a plan successfully within an organization. An example of this is the Affirmative Action of Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO). In this paper the reading will discuss EEO and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), and the impact it has on the population as a whole, it is meant to protect the general public, promote the common good when dealing with health care and review arguments used to support solutions as well as review ethical, and legal issues that need to be reported regarding administrative issues. I will also address managerial responsibilities related to administrative ethical issues as well as identify a proposed solution. The EEO according to the Unites States Department of Labor (2009) is an independent federal agency that was developed to promote equal opportunity within an organization through administrative and judicial enforcement of federal civil rights laws through technical assistance as well as education to the working public on how to utilize the program. EEO laws were also created to allow Human Resources (HR) professionals the ability to hire qualified staff members through the process of conducting in depth interviews of applicants before selecting the best qualified individual to fit the job requirements without discriminating any possible candidates that...
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