Privacy and Security

As medical offices rely more and more on electronic data, making sure the privacy and security of patients’ health information is protected becomes a more difficult task. It is important your business knows what information must be protected and provided to a patient to ensure you are following the HIPAA guidelines. Here is a look at what information must be protected, what information must be available, and who must abide by these rules.

Protect

Patient protected information includes:

• Any information a doctor, nurse or other health care provider includes in a medical record
• Written or oral conversations about a patient’s health care between health care providers
• Information about patients included in their health insurers’ computer system
• Patients' billing information

Provide

Information that must be provided to patients includes:

• Health records
• Health record corrections
• An option before patient health information can be used or shared for specific purposes, including marketing
• An option for patients to receive a report when their health information is shared for specific purposes

People

Those who are responsible for protected health information include:

• Physicians, nurses, nursing homes, clinics, pharmacies, hospitals and other health care providers
• Health insurance companies, HMOs
• Specific government programs including Medicare and Medicaid

It is important that businesses that deal with protected health information know what they can and cannot disclose about patients, and how to properly provide that information. For a more detailed list of requirements, click here.

By Jacqueline Persandi