2nd International Summit on the Future of Health Privacy

Where is health privacy going in the digital era? How well do all the stakeholders understand HIPAA in the world of digital media and mobile technology?

Don't miss the upcoming 2nd International Summit on the Future of Health Privacy. Join national and international experts on health privacy, technology, and law; patient advocates; industry experts and top government officials to discuss today's most urgent health privacy issues.

When: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 - Thursday, June 7, 2012

Where: Webinar + Georgetown Law Center in Washington, DC 20001

Learn more and register for the live event or webcast here.

Practice Fusion Launches Social Media-Style Messaging for Doctors

The following is a press release that caught my attention today:

Practice Fusion Launches Social Media-Style Messaging for Doctors

HIPAA-compliant messaging designed to improve continuity of patient care across medical practices

SAN FRANCISCO - April 18, 2012 – Practice Fusion, the fastest growing Electronic Medical Record (EMR) community in the US, launched a HIPAA-compliant messaging feature today within its EMR to enable physicians, nurses and medical providers to communicate with colleagues outside their practices. The service replicates intuitive social media-style messaging to improve medical collaboration and ensure the continuity of patient care.

HHS announces proposed changes to HIPAA Privacy Rule

HITECH lets people know who has accessed their health information

A Notice of Proposed Rulemaking concerning the accounting of disclosures requirement under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability (HIPAA) Act Privacy Rule, is available for public comment. The proposed rule would give people the right to get a report on who has electronically accessed their protected health information.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is proposing changes to Privacy Rule, pursuant to the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act. HITECH is part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

“This proposed rule represents an important step in our continued efforts to promote accountability across the health care system, ensuring that providers properly safeguard private health information,” said OCR Director Georgina Verdugo. “We need to protect peoples’ rights so that they know how their health information has been used or disclosed.”

Implement a Comprehensive and Successful EHR Strategy

Citrix is presenting a complimentary webinar titled, "Implement a Comprehensive and Successful EHR Strategy."

Learn how to implement a comprehensive and successful EHR strategy that centralizes desktop and application management thereby eliminating security breaches and reducing operational costs by up to 40%.

Hear from industry expert, Ed Rodriquez on the following ways Citrix can help:

• Reduce EMR application management and operational costs by 40%
• Simplify and accelerate rollout for critical apps such as Cerner Millennium, GE Centricity, Eclipsys Sunrise Clinical Manager and many others
• Manage the looming Windows 7 migration within hours
• Eliminate security breaches covered under HIPAA and HITECH

Click here for more information about this webinar.

Healthcare Security Oversight for HIPAA Audit and Compliance

There's a nice whitepaper by ArcSight titled, "Healthcare Security Oversight for HIPAA Audit and Compliance." You can download that paper here (PDF). In 9 pages, ArcSight does a nice job summarizing some important elements of HIPAA compliance in this digital age. Here's a paragraph from the executive summary:

The solution to this problem is for organizations to design and develop unique, best practice-focused compliance programs based on their infrastructure, organization and operational risk. This requires setting and implementing a number of standards within the organization, including technical and paper-based policies, procedures, standards and technical controls. The resulting security program must incorporate a strong layer of audit to demonstrate appropriate governance over the confidentiality, availability and integrity of ePHI and the program’s relevance to the requirements set forth in the HIPAA Security Standard.

Interested in some other reports by ArcSight?

• Solution Brief for Healthcare Payers 
• Solution Brief for Healthcare Providers

Amkai to provide portals for surgical patients

AMKAI EMBRACES PATIENT PORTAL SOLUTIONS
Amkai joins forces with Medfusion to provide surgical customers and affiliated practices patient-to-provider communication solutions

Waterbury, CT and Cary, NC ---March 9, 2010 --- Amkai  announced today that they have selected Medfusion, the forerunner in patient-to-provider online communication solutions, to provide ambulatory surgery centers, surgical hospitals and affiliated practices with a HIPAA-compliant patient portal to improve office efficiencies.

Are you prepared for HIPAA 5010?

When you hear something like "HIPAA 5010," you may think that the 5010 is referring to a year. Well, if it's currently 2009, then 5010 is a long ways away...

Actually, HIPAA 5010 refers to a new standard that will replace the current version (ASC X12N 4010A1) transactions. So how does 4010A1 compare to 5010? There are changes in claims information as they relate to Medicare, informed consent, patient privacy, and much more. 4010 was first adopted in 2000 and amended in 2002 to version 4010A1. Now, we're about to see many shift to 5010 (some are already making changes to adopt 5010). In the world of health IT, you could carry conversations simply using acronyms.

Here's a key to the health IT alphabet soup:

• HIPAA = Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act 
• ASC = Accredited Standards Committee X12N 
• EDI  =  Electronic Data Interchange

The Accredited Standards Committee (ASC) X12 develops electronic data interchange (EDI) standards and related documents for national and global markets.

To learn more, you can visit: http://www.x12.org/

HIPAA

We've all heard the term HIPAA. How often do we stop to think what it means?

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)

Your health data is probably secure. However, is it portable? What are you doing to make it portable so that it's available wherever you are? If you haven't signed up for a personal health record (PHR) service, you may want to look into that. Google Health or Microsoft HealthVault?