The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) was an act brought forth by the United States Congress. It ensures health protection for workers, especially in dire cases of unemployment or displacement. This Act is beholden to its clients in terms of accountability of service providers, top-notch health insurance offers and an overall effective management of the health resources for the betterment of its people.With the increase in technology and the dependence of many state systems on it to increase effectiveness, it had become necessary also to ensure the privacy and protection of health data. It is also important to facilitate electronic data interchange between different health institutes and otherwise to keep the health system well maintained and controlled.

Up until just before the enactment of the Act, there were violations of health security and privacy norms wherein health centres and medical services were seen to be working together, to the detriment of the patient. With HIPAA, there is a greater responsibility toward dissemination of the correct information and withholding of that information which the health practitioners think it necessary for the patient to know. While the limits of this practice still have not been decided upon, it is a process under construction.

With this act, security and privacy are the main concerns:

– It seeks to ensure that the information maintained by different health agencies is only controlled and monitored by those that have been made incharge of the process.

– The exchange of information can only be carried out in predetermined modes and channels and should not be made accessible to all.

– There are three safeguards in order to maintain privacy of information, the administrative, the physical and the technical methods. The different branches address different aspects of privacy and security and have to manage their terrain.

– The Electronic Protected Health Information or EPHI is an important component of this process which lays the foundation for computerised health system to work. The hardware and software have to suitably strengthened, the personnel in charge made responsible and closed information system must be used or encryption must be kept in place in order for the information to be safe.

This Act has strengthened the trust that the common man can have in the health system, to safeguard his health with suitable rights and policies that he can activate. It also puts the onus on the government to manage private medical centres and practitioners and to ensure that their activities are beyond doubt. In extending medical benefit to the people, the government has to make sure the infrastructure is in place to allow for rights and benefits to be activated.

But it is important to remember that this extends to only those programmes of the government that are health-related. So, food stamps, insurance policies (excluding the medical) and health programs begun by the government, including the community health centres do not feature in the ambit of the HIPAA. Only health care providers and health care clearinghouses are part of this policy.

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: Wellness, Fitness and Diet
Keywords: hipaa privacy rule,health insurance providers,healthcare clearinghouses,Health care providers,Health