HIPAA Checklist for Healthcare Software

Today, the healthcare Software industry is one happening and challenging industry. Healthcare IT solutions and services used for streaming processes. The healthcare systems focus on what patients, clinicians, and the administration needs. Various IT solutions are rising due to their reduced cost and integration systems. The increased use of technology has created security problems.

According to the 2019 survey, there are 510 healthcare data breaches. With over 41.11 million exposed and stolen records, which equates to 42.5 data breaches per month. Vast improvements were recorded from January 2020 with over 1.03 defilement per day. The primary causes are data theft, unauthorized access, and other hacking incidents.

There are many ways for data breaches, and some instances could be life-threatening. Consequently, how one can deal with these breaches? Your answer to this is HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accounting Act). Presently, HIPAA comes into the picture. The Healthcare industries provide Healthcare solutions to follow regulations proposed by HIPAA. It forms an integral part of the entire fraternity.

Let’s understand HIPAA in a better way

HIPAA primarily modernizes the flow of healthcare information. Note how healthcare insurance industries maintain identified data. HIPAA protects you from fraud and theft from healthcare coverage which aims to simplification of administration. The security of electronic records and insurance portability.

Healthcare software should be HIPAA compliant. It should offer a framework to ensure process completion as per HIPAA rules. If you don’t obey the HIPAA norms, you can get fined heavily from $100 to $50,000 per user violation. The highest penalty is $1.5 million per year. Check the compliance group list to see all HIPAA fines.

What are the significant aspects of software development in the healthcare industry?

Any healthcare app development company should install the below elements. Healthcare software, it should ensure HIPAA IT compliance. Check below recommendations

Audits

Hire healthcare developer to perform a regular audit. And identify the risk for data breaches. A HIPAA-compliant healthcare software analyzes the compliance level of the medical organization. It provides detailed information about current errors, risks, and other recommendations. The audits are done in the form of quizzes to make easy use of medical staff.

Recovery Plan

The above audit will help to forecast the errors. Which relates to HIPAA compliance. The recommendation plan will help to correct mistakes and prevent them. Every medical institution has a recovery plan and uses various healthcare technologies. The tool should start a particular program for a specific situation.

Documentation

It’s the main task for any institution to work with documents. The software will ease documentation processing. Where the healthcare providers install such a system in their organization. For HIPAA medical software in documentation processing, it adds:

• Simplicity
• Strict Structure
• Secure Data Storage
• Comprehensibility

What are the rules for HIPAA?

• HIPAA Privacy Rules

The rule talks about PHI protection and states. Which advanced healthcare technologies to protect patient data.

• HIPAA Security Rules

Here the mandatory entities will run regular data breaches. To ensure reliable PHI protection to describe PHI security. It prevents future threats to health information security and for correcting.

• HIPAA Enforcement Rule

The rule covers investigation provisions and details specific to financial penalties. The breaches can range from $100 to $50,000 for the first occurrence.

• Breach Notification Rule

The organization should inform if there are less than 500 data breaches involved. The healthcare team must inform all health and services departments within the next 60 days.

• Omnibus Rule

The rule came in the year 2013, and the rules changed all past supplements and regulations. The changes will expand the obligations of physicians for PHI protection.

Why is HIPAA important in medical software?

HIPAA covers all disclosing patients’ histories, payment records, mental conditions, and more. This rule is laid down for the privacy of the organization and other health-related data. The data is safeguarded with encryption. There are various security HIPAA measures taken for auditing capabilities. For disaster recovery and other data backup procedures.

HIPAA will need companies to create and put in place the data backup option. To secure data, the organization will imperil a plan in case of any crisis. There is a HITECH act that requires institutes to notify affected individuals.

How can one become HIPAA Compliant?

1. Analyze the current HIPAA Security Compliance
2. Fill the Gaps through Remediation Measures
3. Take Control of Data Breaches with Employee Training
4. Preparing Audits through Secure Documentation
5. Agreement Management with HIPAA complaint healthcare app development company
6. Recover the system efficiency via incident management

How HIPAA compliance work for health applications means for Developers?

Not all applications are HIPAA compliant. If you’re dealing with mHealth app development then you can collect, store and send PHI. Several criteria of HIPAA are listed below:

• User type
• The app information type
• The app software type

Comply your app with HIPAA, if your app intended to use the covered entity. The data includes a patient’s medical record for healthcare services. Such as treatment, operation, and payment.

What are the challenges of implementing HIPAA?

Any organization needs simple antivirus software and a firewall to keep data safe. The workers and employees of a healthcare organization spread widely. They need access to view data from laptops, mobile phones, and other tools. One can enable data access outside the network and hence get safety on used devices.

There are a lot of expensive tools available in the market. One needs to protect the network from malware and various other attacks. As data grows continually, managing might become more onerous for healthcare companies.

HIPAA quick questionnaires

1. What are the penalties for HIPAA violations?
   The penalty will issue by the department of health and human services. It’s for OCR (Civil Rights) and the state attorney general.
2. Is texting a violation of HIPAA?
   It’s not true, it depends on the content and the message sent. The mechanism works to ensure integrity. It’s for protected health information (PHI) in certain circumstances.
3. What are the HIPAA Encryption Requirements?
   The requirements for transmission cover entities and implementation mechanisms to encrypt PHI.
4. Is Google Drive a HIPAA complaint?
   HIPAA technology is less about technology and more about how it is used. Even a software solution billed as HIPAA compliant can use in any manner.
5. How do mobile data security and HIPAA compliance work?
   Various healthcare providers and other HIPAA-covered entities embrace the mobile technology revolution. It allows the best use of tablets, smartphones, and other portable devices to work on. The mobile data security measures are insufficient. It covers entities at risk of violating HIPAA regulations.

On a Parting Note

HIPAA standards influence the healthcare industry. It offers a better version and a more secure environment. Impose HIPAA to boost healthcare units. Make it easy to implement its practical use whenever needed.