The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has been moving swiftly to provide guidance on addressing key regulatory issues to aid in the fight to contain and defeat COVID-19. Some of the latest developments include exercising its enforcement discretion on certain good faith disclosures of protected health information (PHI) by business associates, adding FAQs for telehealth … Continue Reading
With first responders on the front lines of helping to fight the coronavirus, sharing information about potential exposure to COVID-19 is critical to protecting them and preventing further spread. In these situations, the information shared is most often “protected health information” (PHI) under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) Privacy Rule. … Continue Reading
The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) wants to make it easier for individuals to reach a healthcare provider, including those most at risk (older persons and persons with disabilities). Effective immediately, during the COVID-19 nationwide public health emergency, OCR announced it will not enforce noncompliance with … Continue Reading
As the coronavirus spreads across the globe and in the United States, providers, businesses, employers, and others are struggling to understand what medical information they can collect and what information they can share. These are difficult questions the answers to which involve considering factors such as long-standing compliance requirements (e.g., HIPAA, ADA, GINA, state law), … Continue Reading
Over the past few months, businesses across the country have been focused on the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) which dramatically expands privacy rights for California residents and provides a strong incentive for businesses to implement reasonable safeguards to protect personal information. That focus is turning back east as the Stop Hacks and Improve Electronic … Continue Reading
Many health care providers, including small and medium-sized physician practices, rely on a number of third party service providers to serve their patients and run their businesses. Perhaps the most important of these is a practice’s electronic medical record (EMR) provider, which manages and stores patient protected health information. EMR providers generally are business associates … Continue Reading
When the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 became law, it made significant changes to the civil monetary penalties for violations of HIPAA. In addition to increasing the amounts of the penalties, HITECH created a tiered approach to penalties, establishing four categories based on levels of culpability. In addition, … Continue Reading
Small and midsized enterprises (SMEs) continue to be targeted by ransomware, phishing and other cyberattacks; the consequences of which could be devastating. Those consequences include putting SMEs out of business, which is unfortunately the case for one small medical practice in Battle Creek, Michigan, as reported by HIPAAJournal. The reality is that the effects of these attacks … Continue Reading
Privacy and cybersecurity risks continue to emerge for organizations large and small. While by no means exhaustive, we briefly discuss some key issues that organizations may need to focus on in 2019 and beyond. Business Email Compromise (BEC)/Email Account Compromise (EAC) – BEC and EAC attacks are widespread and show no sign of slowing in the … Continue Reading
October 2018 marks the 15th annual National Cyber Security Awareness Month. In honor of this occasion, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) and the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) have jointly launched an updated HIPAA Security Risk Assessment (SRA) Tool to help covered entities and business associates comply with … Continue Reading
On September 23, 2018, Governor Jerry Brown signed into law SB-1121 amending certain provisions of the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) which was enacted in June of this year. As we reported previously, CCPA will apply to any entity that does business in the State of California and satisfies one or more of … Continue Reading
Last week, New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal and the New Jersey Division of Consumer Affairs (“Division”) announced that a physician group affiliated with more than 50 South Jersey medical and surgical practices agreed to pay $417,816 and improve data security practices to settle allegations it failed to properly protect the privacy of more … Continue Reading
Nary a week goes by without news of a data breach by a healthcare provider…while there are certainly a good number of breaches resulting from a breach of cybersecurity defenses or from the wrongful exploitation of system security weaknesses, there is still a risk to healthcare providers resulting from the internal operations of the healthcare … Continue Reading
Physician practices and other health care providers respond to numerous requests for confidential patient information from patients and others. Mistakes made by employees fulfilling such requests for medical records or making similar disclosures can expose the practice to civil litigation. A recent decision by the Connecticut Supreme Court (Byrne v. Avery Center for Obstetrics and … Continue Reading
Secretary Tom Price of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced his agency needs “to focus more on the most recent breaches and clarify when entities have taken action to resolve the issues that might have led to their breaches.” Accordingly, HHS’ Office of Civil Rights has launched a revised web tool … Continue Reading
Disclosing protected health information (PHI) to a business associate without a compliant business associate agreement (BAA) is an improper disclosure under the HIPAA privacy and security regulations. According to the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR), an error like that can cost a small healthcare provider $31,000. OCR recently announced a resolution agreement (pdf) with … Continue Reading
We know that data analytics is being used to influence a wide range of things such as the pair of shoes one might want to buy or what news is “trending” on Facebook. Similar tools are being applied to employer-sponsored group health plans. According to a recent HealthcareITnews article, vendors such as Advanced Plan for … Continue Reading
Last week, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) provided guidance for HIPAA covered entities and business associates that use or want to use cloud computing services involving protected health information (PHI). Covered entities and business associates seeking cloud services often have many concerns regarding HIPAA compliance, and this guidance … Continue Reading
The HIPAA breach notification rule has two buckets for classifying data breaches – those that involve “protected health information” (PHI) of 500 or more individuals and those that involve fewer than 500 individuals. Since the breach notification rule became effective, the Office of Civil Rights’ (OCR) focus has been on the 500 and over bucket. But … Continue Reading
Yesterday, the federal Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced Phase 2 of its HIPAA Audit Program (Program). In its announcement, the OCR reports that the Program is underway and provides some helpful FAQs for covered entities and business associates about the Program. Preparation is critical and there are some key points covered entities and business … Continue Reading
Earlier this month, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued guidance on an individual’s right to access the individual’s health information. That an individual has a broad right to access has been recognized in the HIPAA privacy regulations since they became effective in 2003. OCR has found, however, that individuals are facing obstacles to accessing their … Continue Reading
News reports of security risks, hackings and breaches caused by individuals, terror groups or even countries around the world certainly are important and can be unsettling. But, for many organizations, including healthcare providers and business associates, a significant and perhaps more immediate area of data risk rests with an organization’s workforce members. An organization’s information … Continue Reading
As we reported, state Attorneys General have authority to enforce the privacy and security regulations under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), pursuant to the authority granted under the Health Information Technology for Clinical and Economic Health (HITECH) Act. Shortly after announcing plans to seek legislation requiring stronger protections for personal and financial … Continue Reading
Some have called 2014 the “Year of the Data Breach.” That may be true given the steady stream of large-scale data breaches affecting tens of millions of individuals. We do not know if this time next year commentators will be saying the same thing about 2015, but there are signs pointing to a significant tightening … Continue Reading
