News Brief: HHS releases final HIPAA privacy regulations
You may be proud of meeting the Oct. 16, 2002, deadline for the transaction standards portion of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), or you may have successfully filed your request for a one-year extension, but it is now time to look carefully at how your agency will comply with the privacy standards.
The final modifications to the HIPAA privacy rule appeared in the Federal Register on Aug. 14, 2002. Some of the most significant changes for home health providers include:
- Consent. The previous requirement that written consent of the individual would be required to use or disclose the individual’s protected health information for treatment payment and health care operations has been removed.
- Notice of privacy practices. Providers must provide patients with a notice of patient privacy rights and make a good-faith effort to obtain patient’s written acknowledgement of the notice. If written acknowledgement cannot be obtained, the provider must document its efforts and the reason acknowledgement could not be obtained.
- Incidental use and disclosure. Uses or disclosures of a patient’s protected information are permitted if they are incidental to an otherwise permitted use or disclosure. They are not considered a violation of the rule if the covered entity has met the reasonable safeguards and minimum necessary requirements.
- Written authorization. Only one form for written authorizations is required.
- Minimum necessary. The minimum necessary rule no longer applies to disclosures that have been authorized by the individual whose protected health information is being disclosed.
- Business associate contracts. The final rule now gives an additional year to change existing contracts to come into compliance.
- Accounting of disclosures. It no longer is necessary to account for disclosures that have been authorized by the individual.
- Marketing. The final rule requires a covered entity to obtain an individual’s prior written authorization to use his or her protected health information for marketing purposes except for a face-to-face encounter or a communication involving a promotion gift of nominal value.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has published a fact sheet that summarizes the changes. To download the fact sheet as well as the changes published in the Federal Register, go to the HHS Office for Civil Rights’ web site: www.hhs.gov/ocr/hipaa.
You may be proud of meeting the Oct. 16, 2002, deadline for the transaction standards portion of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), or you may have successfully filed your request for a one-year extension, but it is now time to look carefully at how your agency will comply with the privacy standards.You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
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