Tuesday, November 13, 2018

HIPAA Basics

Statutory and Regulatory Background

    The Administrative Simplification provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA, Title II) required the Secretary of HHS to publish national standards for the security of electronic protected health information (e-PHI), electronic exchange, and the privacy and security of health information.

    HIPAA called on the Secretary to issue security regulations regarding measures for protecting the integrity, confidentiality, and availability of e-PHI that is held or transmitted by covered entities. HHS developed a proposed rule and released it for public comment on August 12, 1998. The Department received approximately 2,350 public comments. The final regulation, the Security Rule, was published February 20, 2003.2 The Rule specifies a series of administrative, technical, and physical security procedures for covered entities to use to assure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of e-PHI.

    The text of the final regulation can be found at 45 CFR Part 160 and Part 164, Subparts A and C.

Who is Covered by the Security Rule

    The Security Rule applies to health plans, health care clearinghouses, and to any health care provider who transmits health information in electronic form in connection with a transaction for which the Secretary of HHS has adopted standards under HIPAA (the “covered entities”) and to their business associates. For help in determining whether you are covered, use CMS's decision tool.

    Read more about covered entities in the Summary of the HIPAA Privacy Rule - PDF - PDF.

Business Associates

    The HITECH Act of 2009 expanded the responsibilities of business associates under the HIPAA Security Rule. HHS developed regulations to implement and clarify these changes.

    See additional guidance on business associates.

What Information is Protected

    Electronic Protected Health Information. The HIPAA Privacy Rule protects the privacy of individually identifiable health information, called protected health information (PHI), as explained in the Privacy Rule and here - PDF - PDF. The Security Rule protects a subset of information covered by the Privacy Rule, which is all individually identifiable health information a covered entity creates, receives, maintains or transmits in electronic form. The Security Rule calls this information “electronic protected health information” (e-PHI).3 The Security Rule does not apply to PHI transmitted orally or in writing.






references
https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/security/laws-regulations/index.html

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