The Datamax Thinking Blog

The multifunction copier is covered in the Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act and the HIPAA Security Rule. It's considered a machine that stores, transmits, receives, or creates protected health information.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 is 20 years old, so you have a lot of experience with following its requirements. Your healthcare office has several security measures in place to stay HIPAA compliant, but you may be overlooking a key area: your digital copiers. Here are a few ways you could be compromising your patients' health information due to this oversight.

Cloud-based document management solutions can make you a better care provider, as long as you do your homework.

As a healthcare office manager, you have distinct goals, not the least of which is to make sure that staff can access medical records at a moment's notice, as this can sometimes make the difference between life and death. To address this, you might feel that the cloud is the tool to use.

However, you also have to protect patients' medical information. The cloud has experienced several newsworthy failures to protect personal information lately, and you don't want your patients' records to be newsworthy, too. Considering your need to protect patient privacy and comply with HIPAA regulations, you might even want to avoid using the cloud altogether because it's too big a risk.

For organizations that have to accommodate less voluminous records and for those organizations that only need to convert documents from the day record digitization begins, many copiers will be up to the task.

It is absolutely vital that records are readily accessible to ensure that your patients receive the best care possible. This means that every organization, from the largest hospital to one-person general practitioner practices, needs to be able to obtain patient records. Every individual involved in a patient's care, from doctors to nurses, need to be able to view a patient's medical history.

While access is key, HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) and the HITECH (Health Information Technology for Economical and Clinical Health) Act have established strict standards for ensuring the security of those records. A balance must be struck between access and security.

When seeking to find that balance, paper records can hold you back and make compliance more difficult. Paper records are difficult to share and not inherently secure, since documents can be lost, misplaced, or stolen.

Being HIPAA compliant doesn't just protect you from fines; it helps protect your patients' trust in you.

The federal government requires all organizations and individuals who handle patient health information to be HIPAA compliant. Office managers must work to ensure that all confidential patient information is only viewed by authorized personnel and is protected against theft.

The HIPAA rules that apply to medical offices take up 115 pages. It is absolutely vital that you read through all the rules to ensure that you are in compliance. In 2013, HIPAA policy changed. After reading through those changes, Medical Economics identified seven potential violations that could leave your office open to fines that range from $100 to $50,000. Here are those seven issues and how to ensure you are HIPAA compliant.

To comply with HIPAA, you must ensure PHI confidentiality, integrity, and availability. This means that the data is only available and alterable by authorized persons or processes.

Every modern office has a copier, and if it's a doctor's office, it must be HIPAA compliant. While multifunction copiers can be HIPAA compliant, none of them are compliant out of the box.

There are a few unscrupulous dealers that will say that their copiers are HIPAA compliant out of the box, hoping to capitalize on doctors and hospitals that want to get compliant as fast as possible by making a simple purchase.

HIPAA is not defined by technology, but by the policies and procedures that secures a patient's protected health information (PHI). To comply with HIPAA, you must ensure PHI confidentiality, integrity, and availability. This means that the data is only available and alterable by authorized persons or processes.

How many times have you searched the practice from top to bottom, looking for patient records, wasting precious time?

When you work in the medical field and you're helping patients, it's easy to forget that your medical practice is also a business. Your back-office processes are just as important as what you're doing on the front-line. If you struggle with paperwork filling everyone's desks, it's time to look into the four key benefits of document management software.

If your practice is trying to decide whether to use an EMR or EHR system, it's important to know about these differences and to understand how an EHR system can be more beneficial to your practice.

As a healthcare provider – whether you work at a doctor's office, medical/critical care clinic, hospital, or any other type of care facility – you have to deal with mountains of paperwork, from insurance forms to patient records. You also know the value of technology platforms such as electronic medical records (EMR) and electronic health records (EHR). Both are valuable tools in managing patient information. However, although many staff members use the terms interchangeably, they're not the same thing. Here are the differences between the two and what you need to know about each technology.

Your staff works hard every day to keep patients happy and healthy. Get them a EHR system capable of making the most out of their time and efforts every day, and streamline your medical record keeping at the same time.

You have countless options for electronic health record (EHR) systems, and every vendor wants to claim that they have the best solution for your needs. This technology moves you away from endless paper files and keeps patients' health information in digital form. Authorized medical professionals have an easier time accessing this information quickly rather than waiting for your office to mail or fax documents. When you evaluate EHR systems, keep an eye out for these seven features.

Physicians who fail to protect patient privacy face serious consequences. Security breaches bring bad press, and related fines range from $100 - $50,000 for each violation.

Office equipment has been transformed in recent decades. Today, state-of-the-art technology is available at affordable prices, and many physicians are taking advantage of the convenience and efficiency of digital copiers, scanners, and printers.

However, the new technology is not without risk. Digital equipment, such aa multifunction copiers, stores patient health information that is protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). Users must take steps to protect patient privacy from the hackers who wish to exploit it.

While many companies express a desire to effectively manage HIPAA requirements, they’re worried they’re not always doing it perfectly.

By now, I think everyone has signed (or ticked the box if your doctor uses a tablet) a HIPAA form. Most of us know it has “something” to do with privacy, but we simply sign the form and then shuffle back to a seat to await our appointment.

For those of you who provide healthcare services; it’s not as simple as that.