Attention Business Working in US Health Care
Are you a HIPAA Business Associate? Are you protecting your data?
Attention healthcare professionals and those working with healthcare.
Many HIPAA covered entities don’t know and many don’t care about managing their HIPAA business associate relationships. Ignoring the regulations in the past may not have caused issues however, times have changed and HIPAA violations are striking small clinics and their business associates all over the country.
Electronic medical records allow medical professionals to share information with peers. This can be a huge advantage to the clinic and the patient but it has also created opportunity for patient record security issues and HIPAA violations.
Enforcement of HIPAA requirements is now at unprecedented levels with millions of dollars of fines already levied.
Compliance of health records needs to be taken seriously with medical clinics and their business associates. Risks are growing daily and the new rules extend to compliance beyond you and your business partners, and now onto their subcontractors. The chain is getting longer and it all rests on whoever is the weakest link in the chain.
HIPAA business associates have been responsible for many data breaches over the past few years. The federal data breach website shows that over 20% of data breaches are caused by business associates. HIPAA rules extend beyond the medical clinic. Omnicell, a company that sells dispensing carts to health care providers recently breached 68,000 patient records after an employee downloaded data to a laptop, which was stolen.
Who is a HIPAA business associate?
- Shredding companies
- Electronic Medical Records providers
- Collections Companies
- IT companies that help support your network
- Independent transcriptionists and billing specialists
- Health care equipment companies
- (new in the 2013 Final Rule) Companies that provide storage for paper and electronic data, even if they never access the data.
Are you an attorney who works in the healthcare industry? You must protect legal healthcare records under the new HIPAA rules.
If your business works with healthcare clinics, medical centers or any healthcare organization you need to make sure you are HIPAA compliant. Ignoring HIPAA is not longer acceptable; you are responsible for making sure all information is secured, safe and protected.
Is your business HIPAA compliant? If you are unsure, call our healthcare and HIPAA IT professionals and book a no obligation discussion about your healthcare information and HIPAA compliance requirements.
We are your trusted team of Indianapolis IT Service Professionals.