As most of the protected information of patients is stored electronically the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) has stipulated that all technical requirements pertaining to safeguarding the information needs to be complied with. There have been tremendous technological advancements in the way patient records are stored and safeguarded and there should be checks and counter checks in place to ensure that this information is not misused.

Top 6 Technical Requirements Of HIPAA

1. The protected information of patients must only be accessed by authorized individuals and it must be protected using passwords. If there is more than one employee who will be accessing the records of patients they would need to be provided with unique individual passwords.

2. The records of patients would be accessed for specific purposes by employees and it would be advisable to identify the various situations in which access would be required. The computer monitors where the information is been accessed should be positioned in such a way that the screen is not visible to others.

3. When the confidential information is transmitted using emails, fax, Internet or Intranet, it is important to ensure that all safety procedures are followed. The various processes that are in place must ensure that the transmission is safe and secure.

4. There are various Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act security guidelines that need to be complied with. This will ensure that the data is not compromised and its integrity is maintained. There can be many human errors that could put this important piece of information at risk and when you have proper security processes in place, it will help in safeguarding it better.

5. If anyone tries to access the information without proper authorization there should be enough safeguards in place that will help in sending an alert to the compliance officer or anyone else who is authorized to check it. If the screen is inactive for a specified period of time, it must again request a password to log in. This will ensure that only individuals who are authorized will be able to access it.

6. There can also be various encryption tools used for the purpose of safeguarding the confidential information of patients. The encrypted data can only be accessed by individuals who will have passwords for decrypting it. So even if an unauthorized person has managed to access the information they would not be able to read it.

All these simple measures will ensure that the confidential patient information is safeguarded and protected. Apart from storing and accessing the protected information the authorized employees would also be required to destroy records in a phased manner. All the electronic records would need to be destroyed in a proper way so that no one is able to access and misuse them.

The policies that need to be implemented by the health care providers in their organizations would need to comply with all the requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. There should also be anti-virus software installed in all the computers to help safeguard the protected information of patients.

For more information, please visit our HIPAA Privacy Rule website.

For more information, please visit our HIPAA Privacy Rule website http://www.hipaaprivacyrule.com

Author Bio: For more information, please visit our HIPAA Privacy Rule website.

Category: Medical Business
Keywords: health care organizations ,HIPAA,Health Insurance ,HIPAA Regulations ,HIPAA act