Activeitem Billing HIPAA Compliance (Your Strategic Partner In Medical Billing)

As a reputable medical billing service provider, Activeitem Billing acknowledges and maintains that any provisions and regulations under HIPAA, OSHA, or any state legislation in the United States pertaining to any personal/private data, whether it is about the privacy and security of the health record or the financials of any individual or group, are followed and maintained by the operational processes.

Activeitem Billing follows the patient information privacy and security rules very stringently. All members of our billing and coding consortium, transcription teams, as well as our workforce and business affiliates comply with HIPAA regulations and the Activeitem Billing HIPAA policies.

Any member of our team who deals closely with patient health information is provided training about the privacy and security procedures to be adopted to handle the patient health data. Moreover, this information is disclosed to no one except our clients who are authorized to receive this information and employees who are working on the client’s account.

What is OSHA & Its Purpose:

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, more commonly known by its acronym OSHA, is established by Congress in 1971 following the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 with the purpose of ensuring safe and healthful working conditions for working men and women; obligating enforcement of the standards developed under the Act; assisting and encouraging states in their efforts to assure safe and healthful working conditions; by providing for research, information, education, and training in the field of occupational safety and health.

What Is HIPAA

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a federal law that required the implementation of national standards to protect sensitive patient health information from being disclosed without the patient’s consent or knowledge. The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued the HIPAA Privacy Rule to implement HIPAA requirements. The HIPAA Security Rule protects a subset of the information covered by the Privacy Rules.

HIPAA Privacy Rule

The Privacy Rule’s rules govern how entities subject to the Privacy Rule use and disclose personal health information (also known as “protected health information”). “Covered entities” refers to these individuals and businesses. Individuals’ rights to know and regulate how their health information is used are similarly protected under the Privacy Rule. The Privacy Rule’s main purpose is to ensure that people’s health information is fully protected while maintaining the flow of health information needed to provide for and encourage high-quality health care and protect the public’s health and well-being. The Privacy Rule establishes a delicate balance between permitting necessary access to data while also maintaining the privacy of persons receiving care.

Importance of HIPAA

HIPAA is incredibly important for improving the privacy of healthcare details. Apart from these the major implications of HIPAA are as follows:

1. It increases personal privacy in terms of the healthcare information of the patients.
2. It prevents discrimination.
3. It secures the process of sharing confidential health information.
4. It streamlines different administrative healthcare functions and improves the efficiency of the whole healthcare industry.
5. It ensures all the covered entities use the same code sets and nationally recognized identifiers.
6. It requires the covered entities to implement multiple defenses to protect sensitive personal and health information.
7. It mandates the use of strong passwords and also that the providers should have a data backup plan in place.
8. It reduces medical errors and further leads to regular auditing of the system.