What is HIPAA Compliance?

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) sets the data protection standards related to the unlawful use and disclosure of Protected Health Information (PHI). HIPAA compliance reinforced and regulated by the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The Office of Civil Rights is provided with the power to enforce HIPAA Compliance in the form of investigating common HIPAA violations. Entities and Businesses covered under HIPAA include anyone providing treatment, payments, operations in the Healthcare industry, or anyone who has access to patient information and provides services in the Healthcare industry. Healthcare organizations must follow HIPAA compliance to protect the privacy and integrity of health information of clients. Learn more about how to stay HIPAA compliant with FileCloud.

HIPAA file sharing ensures the secure transfer of protected health information (PHI) while maintaining compliance with regulations. It employs encryption and access controls to safeguard sensitive data, preventing unauthorized access and breaches. FileCloud is a robust platform designed to facilitate HIPAA file transfer and storage, ensuring the protection of electronic protected health information (ePHI). It offers advanced security features such as end-to-end encryption, both in transit and at rest, to safeguard sensitive data.

Coverage Rules – HIPAA File Sharing

Healthcare organizations are discovering the Cloud storage system, which can change the way they look at data storage and security. But when it comes to the security of the system, the main issue that may arise for the protection of healthcare data is its compliance with HIPAA. Some companies are even afraid to talk about HIPAA. First things first if your organization deal in the healthcare industry, compliance with HIPAA is mandatory otherwise be ready to pay hefty fines. Keeping in view the limited knowledge that organizations have regarding HIPAA, we have come up with a guide on HIPAA which will explain everything that you need to know. Check out complete 2020 Guide on HIPAA compliant file sharing service provider.

HIPAA compliant data transfer ensures the secure transmission of sensitive healthcare information, adhering to strict privacy regulations. With encryption and access controls, it safeguards patient data during transfers between authorized parties.

What is Protected Health Information?

Protected Health Information (PHI) is any data in medical records that can be used to identify patients or clients and is protected under the HIPAA compliance law. The data that forms part of PHI include names, addresses, health status, phone numbers, insurance policy numbers, and social security numbers, etc. When PHI is stored, transferred, or accessed electronically on the cloud or internet also falls under HIPAA rules. This electronically stored data comes under ePHI and is governed by all the rules and guidelines established to protect user data.

What is the Primary Purpose of HIPAA Regulations?

The main aim with which the HIPAA guidelines are framed is to uphold the integrity and sanctity of Protected Health Information (PHI). The HIPAA regulations provide a framework regarding Privacy rules, Security rules, and Data breach notifications rules.

• Privacy rule provides standards for the privacy of the data
• Security rule standardizes and streamlines the handling of ePHI information
• Data Breach rule lays down the protocol to be followed in case PHI data is compromised

Who Needs to be HIPAA Compliant?

The organizations that must follow HIPAA regulations can be broadly categorized into two types:

Covered Entities – A covered entity in HIPAA rulebook is referred to as an organization that deals in healthcare plans, firms collecting health-related data, healthcare clearing-houses, or transmitting or sharing the PHI data electronically. The two main reasons for ePHI data transmission is for Healthcare related Financial Transactions and Insurance Processing.

Business Associates – A Business associate under the rulebook is an organization that works on behalf of the covered entities. These business associates act as service providers handling a wide scope of ePHI data. Some of the Business associates that come under HIPAA compliance are billing companies, consultants, cloud service providers, physical storage providers, accountants, and many more. FileCloud is a cloud storage provider that offers HIPAA compliant file sharing and hosting service that handles ePHI data on behalf of the customers.

What are the HIPAA Rules?

HIPAA rules were first enacted in 1996 and since then have gone tremendous changes. Let’s look at some of the rules that are mandatory to be followed to stay compliant.

Privacy Rules – These rules lay the foundation of the national standard for patient’s rights. Some of the standards deal with patient’s rights to PHI, healthcare provider’s right to deny information access, Use and disclosure of information by the organization, etc. The covered entities need to ensure that employees are trained on policy guidelines on a yearly basis and also organization needs to maintain complete documentation of the regulatory standards.

Security Rules – These rules help in setting up standards for storing, transmitting, and handling of the ePHI data. The security needs to be updated regularly so as to stay compliant. The data protection of ePHI covers the technical, physical, and administrative safeguards that must be regularly checked for any healthcare organization. Security rules cover both covered entities and business associates.

Data Breach Rules – Data Breach notification rules specify protocols that must be undertaken in case of a data breach. These rules lay the set of standards that covers entities and business associates that they must undertake when the system is compromised. The thing to be kept in mind is that organization must report all the data breaches to the authorities failing to do so will call for a huge penalty.

Omnibus Rule – The Omnibus rule is an add-on to the HIPAA regulation that was enacted to cover the business associates under its gamut. It mandates that business associates must be compliant with HIPAA and also covers the rules that must be undertaken for Business Associate Agreements (BAAs). These agreements are contracts that must be signed between a covered entity and business associate or between two business associates before any flow of ePHI data can be made between them.

Temporary Changes to HIPAA Compliance During the COVID-19 Pandemic

In these unprecedented times of National public healthcare emergency, temporary changes have been made to HIPAA compliance. The changes have been made concerning the penalties that were imposed on non- compliance with HIPAA. Now it has been decided that certain provisions of HIPAA rules will not be imposed on both covered entities and business associates. This has provided the organizations with a sigh of relief but at the same time, it doesn’t mean that they should slack and not work towards following complete guidelines.

Takeaway

Looking at all the information above, It’s fair to say that HIPAA compliance is mandatory for all the entities and associates that deals with the ePHI data. Also, looking at the rising trend of Cloud usage among the organization, It is necessary on your part to look for cloud storage that is completely HIPAA compliant. To make things easy for you, FileCloud is one such cloud storage and file-sharing provider that is HIPAA-HITECH compliant and offers 360° complete protection to the electronic health data. The power of FileCloud lies in its encryption technology that provides security to data at rest and while transferring too. Also, the technological expertise that FileCloud IT experts have is unmatched across its competitors.

Read more about secure file sharing for healthcare organizations.