HIPAA Privacy Notice

HIPAA Compliance

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996:

  • Improved efficiency in healthcare delivery by standardizing electronic data interchange; and
  • Protecting confidentiality and security of health data through setting and enforcing standards
Who is affected?

  • All healthcare organizations including home healthcare providers, PBM’s, physicians, health plans, employers, public health authorities, life insurers, clearinghouses, billing agencies, information systems vendors, and service organizations and universities.
More specifically, HIPAA calls for:

  • Standardization of electronic patient health, administrative and financial data
  • Security standards protecting the confidentiality and integrity of individually identifiable health information "past, present, and future."
The final Rule for privacy was published December 28, 2001.  Compliance was required on April 14, 2001 for most covered entities.  It was intended to:
Establish who has the right to access personally identifiable health information.  The privacy standard includes:
  • Limit the non-consensual use of and release of health information
  • Give patients new rights to access their medical records and to know who else has accessed them
  • Restrict most disclosure of health information to the minimum needed for the intended purpose
  • Establish new criminal and civil sanctions for improper use and disclosure