Hospital compliance attorney

 

A hospital compliance attorney is a legal professional, who is in a position to provide comprehensive compliance and counseling for the hospitals to ensure that they adhere to the state and federal regulations that are implemented within the field of healthcare law. These attorneys have a strong understanding about the healthcare law. As a result, they are in a position to provide assistance to all situations with related to hospital compliance violations.

How can a hospital compliance attorney help with ensuring HIPAA compliance  

The Health and Human Services Department of United States issued the privacy rule to put into practice the requirement of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. This privacy rule, which is also known as HIPAA addresses the usage and disclosure of people’s health information called “protected health information (PHI)”. This term refers to any health information that is held by a covered entity which concerns provision of health care, health status or payment that is provided for health care, which can be linked with an individual.

The main objective of this privacy rule is to make sure that all the people’s health information is protected suitably while giving the authorities the opportunity to acquire required information that is needed to promote high quality health care services. The effectiveness of this method has proven, and it has played an important role behind the health and well-being of public. This rule maintains an appropriate balance between the two aspects, and it helps both people and authorities to get what they want with a hassle free mind.

Reason behind the presence of hospital compliance laws

From the HIPAA privacy compliance, individuals have the right to go ahead and request that a covered entity correct any PHI that is inaccurate. This process also required covered entities to take necessary measures to ensure privacy and confidentiality with individuals. The entities must notify individuals when they use their PHI. This can be the reason why covered entities maintain a track of all the PHI document disclosures. The privacy rule of HIPAA also requires that a covered entity should develop comprehensive HIPAA privacy policies with respect to PHI.

The procedures and policies should be designed in a reasonable way by taking the size and activity types into consideration. They should have the potential to protect the health information of public. All the responsible entities are encouraged to use templates in order to get a jump start in HIPAA security policy creation. These templates can be used by insures, health care entities including hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, skilled nursing facilities, clinical laboratories, assisted living care facilities, physicians, pharmacies, PPOs, rehabilitation facilities, employer plans and all the other businesses and providers that are associated with healthcare organizations.

Importance of HIPAA Training

This rule has made HIPAA privacy training as a popular topic in American healthcare industry. The HIPAA privacy training pays attention to HIPAA legislation implications and compliance requirements that are applicable to any covered entity or organization. Usually, the training process covers HIPAA administrative specification act rules and regulations. The training process assist responsible entities to get updated with the latest regulations and continue their health care services without any hassle. The HIPAA training process is offered to the entities in different ways. They will also be asked to do several certification tests, depending on the training and job role that is required for being HIPAA compliant.

HIPAA privacy compliance is associated with three certification tests. They are the entry level certification test, intermediate level certification test and the professional level test which is available to the providers who need both HIPAA security and privacy policy training. All these tests will keep away criminal penalties and hassle from the health care industry in United States. Therefore, all the employers of covered entities should make necessary arrangements to ensure HIPAA compliance at all times. In case if you need guidance with it, you can seek the assistance of a hospital compliance attorney.

Ensuring HIPAA compliance within the hospitals

The below mentioned steps will assist these employers with HIPAA privacy. The HIPAA privacy rule revolves around PHI, and you must provide special attention to it. The best option available to you is to follow the dictum of minimum disclosure where only bare minimum information is being released to the concerned third parties for the purpose of insurance payment and treatment only. Moreover, these disclosures cannot be provided without the public interest, law enforcement or authorization. Even though disclosure of PHI information gets approved by HIPAA laws, you need to make sure that information is on safe hands at all times. Disclosure of information, even to the family members should be provided by taking a written authorization issued by the patient.

Safety from business associates also hold an important place in HIPAA privacy compliance. There are covered entities which contract some of their functions to business associates, which are not owned by the main company. As an employer, you should ask these business partners to sign a suitable contract that can ensure the privacy and security measures of personal information, which are shared with them for business purposes. A lot of research, which provide important statistics about the healthcare industry deal with personal records of individuals. The service providers should remove identity information from these records before releasing them for the purpose of statistics.

The personal information includes name, address, social security number, email addresses and contact numbers. You should also ask the responsible research agencies to protect the information from unauthorized access. It is better if you can provide your patients with a copy of the NOPP. It explains how you are managing the PHI of them to ensure the protection of their personal information. The document should have a number, which can be used by the patient to contact you at any point of time.

Final words

Apart from these factors, HIPAA employee training also ensure the covered entities to protect their information. The employers should have an in house policy which goes hand in hand with HIPAA laws. The policy must provide adequate training to all the employees on a regular basis, so that they understand everything related to HIPAA laws and privacy compliance. The above points will not only assist smoother working within your organization but also aid in better compliance of the HIPAA Privacy Rules by curtailing possibilities of any breach. In case if your hospital encounters any challenges with this compliance or any other compliance issue, all you have to do is to seek the assistance of a hospital compliance attorney.