Effective Working Knowledge of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (Hipaa)

According to Beauchamp and Childress, the principle of autonomy asserts that a capable and competent individual is free to determine, and to act in accordance with, a self-chosen plan (Beauchamp and Childress as cited in Keating and Smith, 2010). Determining a patient's competence is critical in striking a proper balance between respecting the autonomy of patients who are capable of making informed decisions and protecting those who are not fully capable (Appelbaum, 2007). Tagging children incompetent solely on the basis of their age and not involving them in decision making regarding their health is violation of children's human right. Obtaining consent from parents, rather than children, negates one of the most important principles of medical ethics, which is patient autonomy. Nurses are obligated to promote the health of children by embracing children's right. Nurses' duties which stem out of respect for autonomy include both duties to ensure children's self determination is respected and to refrain from practices that interfere with the children's right of decision making (CARNA,

. HIPAA privacy rules are complicated and extensive, and set forth guidelines to be followed by health care providers and other covered entities such as insurance carriers and by consumers. HIPAA is very specific in its requirements regarding the release of information, but is not as specific when it comes to the manner in which training and policies are developed and delivered within the health care industry. This paper will discuss how HIPAA affects a patient's access to their medical records, how and under what circumstances personal health information can be released to other entities for purposes

When confidential patient information is disclosed without consent it is a violation of the HIPAA Title II Security Rule. This rule was enacted in response to private information being leaked to the news and emails containing privileged information were read by unauthorized people. Identity theft is a real concern so patient privacy should be taken seriously. This is a rule can easily be broken without the

Although in most situations HIPAA takes precedence, the ruling falls in favor of the most protection of an individual’s rights. Three areas of comparisons are as follows: Both HIPPA and Montana law requires health care providers to release medical records to you within a ten day period after receiving your request. There are stipulations when it comes to mental health treatment. Mental health and psychotherapy are not governed in the same manner as medical treatment is under HIPPA. Therefore, states dictate how these particular records are handled. The Montana Codes allow for the release of medical records if seen by a psychiatrist but patients may not access records from treatment facilities for substance abuse. Lastly, HIPAA does not govern the release of records after death. Instead, they leave this up to the individual state to determine. Montana allows the release of records after death to the spouse, parent, adult children, adult siblings and lawyers.

When you go to the hospital you always fill some papers at firs and this is related to HIPAA.

Shadow charts should only contain copies of the original records. Shadow charts are maintained to assist ancillary departments in treating patients. An original record is created after each treatment for the primary record and a copy can be made for the shadow chart only for convenience in providing care. Original records are not to be kept in shadow charts.

If one violates one’s privacy they are looking at very costly civil violations. For unknowing violations, one’s privacy, you will owe $100 per violation and $25,000 for a repeat violation. For violation HIPAA for a reasonable cause, it is $1,000 per violation with $100,000 for repeat violations. As for willful neglect but the violation is corrected within a certain time period it is $10,000 per violation with $250,000 for a repeat violation. Lastly, someone could owe $50,000 per violation and up to a maximum of $1.5 million for a repeat violation that is not corrected within the required time period (Brown,2014). As if that doesn’t seem to get any worse someone is also looking to facing criminal penalties when violating these laws. For individuals who knowingly violate HIPAA laws they can face up to a year of imprisonment. With someone who has the intentions to sell someone’s information to another individual can face up to ten years in prison (Brown, 2014). When starting a job in a hospital all employees are required to sign their understanding of the HIPAA laws for that hospital. Many hospitals require certain training and in-services to provide understanding of the laws and its importance in the hospital setting. If HIPAA is violated most hospitals let the employee know in the paperwork that they sign that they will be terminated immediately.

HIPAA and HITECH Act help address several problems associated with inappropriate use of healthcare information by authorized users. HIPAA requires minimum necessary infor-mation to be released while HITECH goes into a little further detail but still to release minimum necessary information. Several different organizations need to define how they go about han-dling inappropriate use of information. A guideline must be set within the organization on who will have access to the information and how it is disbursed to other healthcare organizations re-questing records.

Any patient that is seen by a physician within the United States is to be protected by the “Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act” or HIPAA, which was passed into law in 1996 (Jani, 2009). All health care facilities dealing with any protected health information (PHI) are to ensure that all physical/electronic processes are safeguarded from any third party entity or unauthorized personnel according to HIPAA. All health care data to include any medical insurance

Release or not to release is the question in today’s healthcare? Being a patient, and going to a doctor’s appointment has really changed versus how it was years ago. Most of us as patients know that we have a right to our own health information, but how is this beneficial to us as patients and healthcare providers? As healthcare is increasingly becoming complex what are ways to enforce these policies and rules? HIPAA rules and standards will need to be the same in each state so there is interoperability the proper way, but will we be able to really accomplish this? This paper will discuss these aspects and ways to overcome these obstacles that are occurring.

Informed consent is the patient’s voluntary agreement to undergo a particular procedure or treatment, such as surgery. The procedural physician should provide information related to the surgical intervention in understandable words. The patient must be conscious and alert at the time the consent is granted. But what happens if the patient is unconscious or mentally incompetent? Consent forms are not legal if the patient is confused, unconscious, sedated or mentally incompetent. Consent may be given in those instances by a parent, spouse, next of kin, or legal guardian. During this week, I experience those instance with two different patients, J.J and B.F. J.J was unconscious secondary to a mobile vehicle accident, which caused him a lot of trauma especially in the respiratory and digestive system. J.J was unable to provide consent for surgery; however, the parents signed all the forms and declared responsibility from him. In the case of B.F, an 85 years old white female that suffer from dementia and lives in a nursing home, the consent was almost impossible to obtain. The patient

This case presents a prime example of privacy violation. The Federal privacy rule 42 CFR, part 2 mandated addition privacy protection for any health record that is generated in the treatment of patients in the federal alcohol and drug program (Hughes, 2002). The HIPAA privacy rule dictates that healthcare organizations must not disclose any identifying patient information, or alert any entity that a particular patient is participating in alcohol/drug treatment program. This type of privacy breach must be reported promptly to the internal review board (IRB), compliance officer, risk management office and the privacy officer at the healthcare organization. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) act and the American Recovery and Reinvestment (ARRA) act also mandated that any healthcare organization or any covered entity under the HIPAA act should promptly notify individual patients about the accidental disclosure of their medical information; the time from discovery of breach of PHI to patient’s notification must not be more than 60 days. In addition, to patient notification, the covered entity must also report such incidents to the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and to the media if the breach affects more than 500 patients, and if the breach affects less than 500 patients, notifying the patients and the

As one of the regulations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) of 1996, Public Law 104-191; the HIPPA Privacy Rule sets “the standards for privacy of individually identifiable health information” (Speers, Wilcox, & Brown 2004). Established by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in 2002, this set of national standards deals with the use and disclosure of health information, in addition to the principles guiding patients’ rights over their health information; which includes the right to review, obtain a copy of their health records, and request corrections. The ultimate goal

HIPAA stands for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. This act is a set of laws which health care professions must follow. However, if violated then one will be facing law suits and criminal charges, and nobody wants that. There are two titles we discussed mainly which are Title I is the Health Insurance Reform and Title II is the Administrative Simplification Act. Title I ensure medical coverage for people who lose or change occupations. It likewise forbids group health plans from denying assurance to people with illnesses and prior conditions, and from setting lifetime coverage limits. On the other hand, Title II coordinates the U.S. Division of Health and Human Services (HHS) to build up national measures for handling electronic healthcare transactions. It additionally requires social insurance associations to actualize secure electronic access to wellbeing information and to stay in consistency with protection controls set by HHS.

There are many legal and ethical situations that healthcare providers will be faced with when providing medical treatment to either a child or an elderly adult. While there is often much discussion regarding the elderly and do not resuscitate orders, there are often times when the decisions for health care of a child may be overlooked. Some of the legal issues that may be faced by healthcare professionals are informed consent, confidentiality, reproductive services and child abuse. Patients have the right to decide what is done to their own bodies, but for children under eighteen, their parents decide for them. A major issue faced by healthcare professionals is parental refusal for treatment. Healthcare providers will be faced with many conflicting ethical and legal situations regarding refusal of a minor’s healthcare and treatment. These issues