Vendors tell AHA they’re ready for HIPAA
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At a recent vendor readiness teleconference hosted by the Chicago-based American Hospital Association (AHA) hospital vendors indicated they are ready for compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) standards for electronic formats and code sets.
"The fact that their vendors are ready, I think, puts providers in a position where now they have to begin thinking about testing and executing the standard to make sure that it works not to wait too long into this process, but start thinking about being ready early next year with respect to the transactional standards," noted George Arges, senior director of AHA’s health data management group.
While noting that providers can expect some changes in reporting requirements to the final notice, which was originally published in May 2000, he indicated vendors were ready for the changes. "Providers should be able to interface their internal operations to the system changes that the venders were offering," he reported.
Lawrence Hughes, AHA director of member operations, said vendors are ready to begin testing with their providers, and that in fact, some have already begun. He said those who have begun testing report it has gone well, and many have testing information available on their web sites for their customers.
"One of the things that really came out from the discussion was that the whole process of working toward compliance is going to be a cooperative effort between the [provider] organizations and their vendors, and their trading partners in ensuring that compliance deadlines will be met," Hughes said.
ACOEM sets HIV/AIDS guidelines for workplace
Recognizing that occupational and environmental medicine physicians play a pivotal role in dealing with the issue of HIV/AIDS in the workplace, the Arlington Heights, IL-based American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) has developed the HIV and AIDS in the Workplace Guideline.
The guideline addresses not only the general issues involved, but also what role the occupational and environmental medicine (OEM) physician should play within the context of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and the Family Medical Leave Act of 1993. It also focuses on and makes recommendations regarding issues specific to the health care industry, including the infected health care worker, exposure prevention, and prophylactic therapy.
"The OEM physician should be actively involved in developing institutional policies that address AIDS and HIV in the workplace," says Mark Russi, MD, lead author and chair of the ACOEM Infectious Diseases Committee, which developed the guideline. "They should serve as a resource to provide advice as needed to both employers and employees and be prepared to respond to an HIV- or AIDS-related medical problem with appropriate triage or care."
The guideline also makes recommendations regarding the handling of sensitive medical information, as well as the complexities of designing reasonable accommodations and evaluating the appropriateness of leaves under the FMLA. Specifically, it includes recommendations concerning the transmission of HIV from health care workers to patients, noting that accumulated evidence has found no basis to restrict the practice of HIV-infected health care workers who perform invasive procedures using appropriate precautions. It does not support notifying patients of a health care worker’s HIV status unless an exposure has taken place.
The guideline is posted on the ACOEM Web site at www.acoem.org. It will also be published in the June 2002 issue of ACOEM’s Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
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