The Health Insurance Portability And Accountability Act ( Hipaa )

HIPAA (Health Insurance and Portability Act of 1996), outlines rules, regulations and the rights of patients to access their healthcare information such as notifications of privacy practices, copying and viewing medical records, and amendments. This paper explains why confidentiality is important today and discusses recourses patients can use if they believe their privacy has been violated. This paper will also discuss criminal and civil penalties’ that can occur for breaking HIPAA privacy rules.

In 1996, Congress passed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, better known as HIPAA. The purpose of HIPAA is to provide guidance and tools to protect and secure patient’s medical records. There are two sections of the act that will be today’s focus – the Privacy Rule and the Security Rule. At the end of this training, employees will understand what HIPAA is, how it applies to [Hospital], and the penalties for violation.

HIPAA - Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act was passed in1996. Act was created to establish procedures on medical information that was available to anyone that requested the information. HIPAA standardized security, privacy and created penalties for violating any of the policy. The compliance plan for HIPAA has five stages in order to make sure the act is followed according to process placed to help secure security information that could be violating the HIPAA compliance

There are laws in place that protect a patient in the health care setting. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 or HIPAA, as it is known in the healthcare field, was designed to protect the privacy,confidentiality and security of patient information (Pozgar, 2013).Employees the health care field are very aware of HIPAA and the rights of their patients. All staff knows that patient information can only be discussed with qualified individuals on a need to know basis. Speaking about cases outside of work is strictly prohibited. Photography or recording of any patient interaction is also a breach of a patient's rights as well. The problem with this is that there are many policies in place to protect the

Attempts to stop fraud were enhanced under Public Law 104-191, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). The purpose was to improve the Medicare program under title XVIII of the Social Security Act, the Medicaid program under title XIX of such Act, and the efficiency and effectiveness of the health care system. This public law encouraged the development of a health information system through standards and requirements for the electronic transmission of certain health information (aspe.hhs.go). The Act established a program to take action against fraud committed against public and private health plans. The legislation required the establishment of a national Health Care Fraud and Abuse Control Program (HCFAC), under the joint direction of the Attorney General and the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) acting through the Department 's Inspector General (HHS.gov). The HCFAC program is designed to coordinate Federal, State and local law enforcement activities with respect to health care fraud and abuse. The Act requires HHS and Department of Justice (DOJ) detail in an Annual Report the amounts deposited and appropriated to the Medicare Trust Fund, and the source of such deposits. (HHS.gov) I will summarize the impact of these laws as it pertains to how they are impacting the healthcare delivery system. (HHS.gov)

Personal health information can be anything from general information such as the patient’s name, medical record number, social security number, address, or even their date of birth. Any health information pertains to the patient such as diagnosis, medical history, medications. Employees must make sure no medical paper work is visible as well as screen protectors are on all computer screens, where you may be documenting health information. It is important that all health care employees log out of a computer when they leave that station. Employees that are aware of a breach of confidently should use their change of command set up by their facility also notify their incidents or situations to their hospital’s privacy officer. To promote the proper use of health information, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, or HITECH Act, was created. Prior to the HITECH Act, HIPAA violations only resulted in minimal fines. Violations would result in a $100 fine, and a covered entity could only achieve a total of $25,000 in fines in one calendar year. The HITECH Act has broken the violations down into four categories, and has distributed the fines across them based on the category of violation. The first category would be a violations that caused by someone who didn’t know they were violating HIPAA. The fines for this tier are in the range

Picture a world where anyone can access anyone’s personal medical records. Over a million people live in the United States of America, and with that type of power you can bet that the country would be corrupt. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act is there to prevent such events happening. HIPAA, or Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, was implemented to help serve the people and keep information safe. Originally it started out as a way to ensure that Americans going between jobs would still be covered by their insurance companies. Since then the act has came a long way in protecting the American citizens. It prevented the use of medical records for the open public. This prevented the unauthorized use of

It has always been the job of health care providers to maintain doctor-patient confidentiality. Not only is it a legal obligation it is also an ethical obligation to many doctors, nurses, physician’s assistants and many other medical staff. Until recently medical records were primarily recorded on paper and stored in cabinets and locked in what was believed as a secure room. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act also known as HIPAA, was passed on August 21, 1996. Although the law was passed in 1996 it did not become effective until April 14, 2003. This was due to the fact that “Given that Congress did not act to produce these within the timeframe specified by the law the secretary at the Department of Health and Human

Any company that’s looking to comply with the current Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) standards can benefit from the training courses and management tools available through the Accountable platform. Everything that Accountable does is geared towards making HIPAA compliance an easier and more attainable goal. With the intuitive interface you’ll be able to move step by step through everything that needs to be accomplished in order to achieve complete HIPAA compliance, which saves time and effort.

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).

as HIPAA. The primary purpose of HIPAA was to protect an individual from losing their health insurance;

The Health Insurance Portability and Administration Act (HIPAA) is legislation that was signed into law by former president Bill Clinton on 21 Aug, 1996. This legislation was introduced 18 Mar. 1996 by Bill Archer, TX (R) (Health Insurance). The purpose of this legislation was aimed at improving the portability and continual health care insurance coverage of American citizens and reduce the overall waste in medical spending. Not only did it provide the ability to keep ones’ health insurance it also provided protection of patient’s personal health information (PHI), but also provided provisions to simplify billing, expedite the migration to electronic medical records (EMR), and processes for individuals to make complaints and that the complaints be documented along with their disposition (Columbiana County). The HIPAA privacy rules, and its provisions, can be specifically located within 45 CFR 164, Under the provisions of HIPAA, specific information, known as PHI is protected from the unauthorized disclosure of any demographic information that relates to:

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) is the United States government’s principal agency for protecting the health of all Americans and for providing essential human services, especially to those who are unable to help themselves. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) was developed in nineteen ninety-six and became part of the Social Security Act (Bowers,2001). The focus of HIPPA is to protect health care coverage for individuals who lose or change their jobs. Secondly it was designed to ensure security and confidentiality of patient information. HIPPA regulations mandate uniform standard for electronic data transmission of administrative and financial

Congress recognizing the growth in healthcare technology passed into law on August 21, 1996, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) (Booth 2011). HIPAA was created with the purpose of improving the portability and continuity of health care coverage(Booth 2011). The function of this national framework is to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the healthcare delivery system by creating privacy protection that builds on efforts by all 50 states ( Booth 2011). This consolidated effort is geared toward protecting and enhancing the rights of patients by providing them access to their health information and at the same time controlling the inappropriate use or revelation of their pertinent health information (Booth 2011). HIPPA, which is

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.