Yikes!  Want to know why all this HIPAA stuff is so important for medical practices?  Look at who is Number One on the hit list – private practices. Are YOU in compliance??? 

Here’s what HHS says: 

“Since the compliance date in April 2003, HHS has received over 90,001 HIPAA complaints. We have resolved 94% of complaints received through investigation and enforcement (over 22,026)! 

The most common types of covered entities that have been required to take corrective action, in order of frequency:

1.   Private Practices;
2.   General Hospitals;
3.   Outpatient Facilities;
4.   Health Plans (group health plans and health insurance issuers); and,
5.   Pharmacies.

The compliance issues investigated most are, in order of frequency:

A.    Impermissible uses and disclosures of protected health information;
B.    Lack of safeguards of protected health information;
C.    Lack of patient access to their protected health information;
D.    Uses or disclosures of more than the minimum necessary protected health information; and
E.    Lack of administrative safeguards of electronic protected health information.”

Habanero, Inc. has developed a basic HIPAA & HITECH Privacy Policy & Procedure product that is customized to YOUR practice, provides easy to follow instructions for your Privacy Officer, personalized set of HIPAA Privacy forms and documentation & training materials for your staff, including a staff assessment and acknowledgement process.  Call today at (631) 244-5661 to get your own and be prepared for HHS’  OCR Privacy auditors.