When Google, Apple, and other major players deny cooperating with the federal government and allowing access to their computers for PRISM’s massive data surveillance program, healthcare providers and business associates should not be re-assured. Either these players are issuing denials to cover their backsides, or they are admitting that the government is able to breach … Read more
Let’s face it, federal rules and regulations are too complicated for even the Feds to figure them out, so it should come as little surprise that the HIPAA regulations that went into effect in March 2013 have some errors. In a final regulation to clear up “technical errors”, the feds announced June 7 that the … Read more
A maintenance error that turned off a firewall on a computer server in one of 29 clinics in the Idaho State University healthcare system exposed more than 17,500 patient records for a period of 10 months. When the breach it was discovered in 2011, ISU self-reported to OCR as required by the HIPAA/HITECH data breach … Read more
The patient presented at 5 pm with chest pains and shortness of breath. EKG and a blood draw were initiated within 20 minutes. A chest x-ray was performed in another 30 minutes. After several hours, the patient was seen by the ED physician, and then a cardiologist examined the patient. He offered the patient a … Read more
In a prior post, I mentioned that my daughter was about to release a new reference book on HIPAA and predicted the release would come in April. Wrong. College classes and a social activity or two delayed completion until now, and in spite of my grousing about the delays, her Dean’s List performance did vindicate … Read more