HIPAA Assessment

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Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a federal law, mainly focused on protecting sensitive patient health information from being disclosed without the patient's consent or knowledge. The law that provides baseline privacy and security standards for medical information of US citizens.

The standard is applicable to covered entities and their business associates like health care clearinghouses, employer sponsored health plans, health insurers, and medical service providers that engage in certain transactions that involve digital transmission of patient health information (PHI)

HIPAA Regulation divided into Security Rule, Privacy Rule, Transactions and Code Sets (TCS) Rule, Unique Identifiers Rule, Breach Notification Rule, Omnibus Final Rule. HIPAA Security Rule requires implementation of 1) Administrative, 2) Physical, and 3) Technical safeguards.In Addition, it imposes other organizational requirements and a need to document processes analogous to the HIPAA Privacy Rule.

Office of Civil Rights (OCR), explains the failure to provide a “specific risk analysis methodology” is due to Covered Entities and Business Associates being of different sizes, capabilities and complexity. As per OCR, the key objectives of a HIPAA risk assessment are :

Identify the PHI that your organization creates, receives, stores and transmits including PHI shared with consultants, vendors and Business Associates.
Identify the human, natural and environmental threats to the integrity of PHI human threats including those which are both intentional and unintentional.
Assess what measures are in place to protect against threats to the integrity of PHI, and the likelihood of a “reasonably anticipated” breach occurring.
Determine the potential impact of a PHI breach and assign each potential occurrence a risk level based on the average of the assigned likelihood and impact levels.
Document the findings and implement measures, procedures and policies where necessary to tick the boxes on the HIPAA compliance checklist and ensure HIPAA compliance.
HIPAA risk assessment, the rationale for the measures, procedures and policies subsequently implemented, and all policy documents must be kept for a minimum of six years.

HIPAA Assessment Approach

QRC follows a well-documented approach to work alongside our clients aiding them in attaining their compliance goals. This require a Well-documented execution plan along with defined milestones.

Business Understanding

Evaluating business process and environment to understand the in-scope elements

HIPPA Scope Finalization

Finalize the scope elements and prepare the requirement documentation

HIPPA Readiness Assessment

Identify the potential challenges that might arise during requirement implementation

HIPPA Risk Assessment

Identifying and analysing the risks in the information security posture.

HIPPA Data Flow Assessment

Conducting thorough systems analysis to evaluate data flow and possible leakages

HIPPA Documentation Support

Assist you with list of policy and procedure to help you in validation or evidence collection

HIPPA Remediation Support

Support you by recommending solutions to compliance challenges

HIPPA Awareness Training

Conduct awareness sessions for your Team and personnel involved in the scope

Data and Asset Classification

Identify critical vulnerabilities in your system with a robust testing approach

HIPPA Evidence Review

Review of the evidence collected to assess their maturity, in line with the compliance

Final Assessment and Attestation

Post successful assessment, we get you attested for compliance with our audit team

Continuous Compliance Support

Support you in maintaining compliance by providing guidelines

Benefits of HIPAA Certification

Minimize the key Data Risks by establishing authenticity by controlling access privilege

Ensure your customer that you have adequate physical, network, and process security measures in place to deal with their protected health information (PHI).
Avoid expensive penalties on PHI disclosure

Avoid hefty ones that may occur due to HIPAA violation, and save millions by properly addressing the risk issues.Whilst organization may be able to afford the penalties, negative publicity surrounding PHI or ePHI data isn’t something any of us would need.
Robust Security Management Systems to Protect PHI at all levels

Adopting correct policies and procedures will help in ensuring the reliability of the safeguards,showcasing data handling best practices.
Builds the patient's, stakeholder's and partner's confidence in your brand

When your business is HIPAA compliant, you can demonstrate to everyone who is associated with your business that their information is secure with you.The enhanced trust will ultimately result in increased business.
Protecting Image and Reputation

Complying with the requirements of standard helps an entity to reduce reputation loss because, if the data has been compromised, it has a negative affect on business reputation.

frequently asked questions

What are the penalties for HIPAA non-compliance?

Fines can be up to $250,000 for violations or imprisonment up to 10 years for knowing abuse or misuse of individual health information.

What is Protected Health Information (PHI)?

Information collected from an individual by a covered entity that relates to the past, present or future health or condition of an individual and that either identifies the individual or there is basis to believe that the information can be used to identify, locate, or contact the individual...and thus must be protected. PHI is a subset of PII.

What businesses must comply with HIPAA laws?

Any healthcare entity that electronically processes, stores, transmits, or receives medical records, claims or remittances.

What’s the difference between the HIPAA Security and Privacy rules?

HIPAA Privacy Rule addresses appropriate PHI use and disclosure practices by healthcare organizations. The same rules, regulations and policies that regulate Privacy do not necessarily extend to the Security Rule. The HIPAA Security Rule revolves around safeguarding the systems that house or transmit PHI.

Who is responsible for HIPAA?

Every individual (office manager, doctor, etc.) is held responsible for health information they should, can, or do access. Individuals and companies can independently face criminal charges for mishandling PHI.

What are the basic rules on disclosure of PHI?

Basic rules regarding the use of PHI pertain to disclosures as well. Essentially, your practice may use and disclose PHI for your own TPO activities. The regulation also requires that you put in place policies regarding use and disclosure (e.g., who in your practice will be permitted to disclose PHI).\"