HIPAA Privacy Training: Why it important for all healthcare entities?

Posted by johnm0307 on May 7th, 2015

The HIPPA privacy rule is issued by the U.S Department of health and human service to address the use and disclosure of an individual health information-referred as PHI (protected health information).  Protected health information is any kind of personal information which is held by any covered healthcare entity.  The main objective of HIPAA privacy rules is to protect the patients’ health information while allowing the flow of information needed to provide quality health care services. 

The HIPAA privacy rules are applicable and important for all the covered entities involved in the healthcare industry such as healthcare billing services, lab technicians, pharmacy staff, volunteers, medical students, business associates, nurses, medical observers, healthcare cleaner and other staff.  

The knowledge of HIPAA privacy rules is not only important for covered entities, but also for the individuals who are going to take healthcare services. The HIPAA privacy rules provide the following rights to the individuals:

• The PHI must be disclosed only to the individual it is related to, if the individual ask for the same.
• The individuals have rights to ask for the correction of inaccurate information.
• The individual’s healthcare information is shared with the covered entities only after the individual permit.
• The individual can ask for their healthcare information whenever they want.

Earlier the hipaa privacy training is not as important as these days. These days, heavy fine has imposed on the entities that do not follow the privacy rules and regulations. The HIPPA privacy training normally covers the HIPAA Administrative Simplification Act rules and regulations and their implementations to help the entities to become HIPAA privacy compliant. The training also comprises the good knowledge of all the changes and updated in the HIPAA regulations due to HITECH Act, which is a part of the ARRA act of 2009 and Omnibus rules published in 2013.

The HIPAA privacy training comprises four types of certification programs:

CHPA-Certified HIPAA Privacy Associate

This certification is best for those who need the basic level of HIPAA training. It is good for new employees, students, general workforce and also for those who want to understand HIPAA from the basic level.

CHPE- Certified HIPAA Privacy Expert

This certification is good for those professionals who want to improve their HIPAA privacy knowledge.  This type of training program is recommended for human resource professionals and the members of the privacy compliance team.

CHPSE-Certified HIPAA Privacy Security Expert                                               

This certification is recommended to those who are responsible for handling both the privacy and security works.  This training program can be beneficial to team members of the compliance officers from covered entities, business associates and consultants that offer services in the healthcare industry.

Article source: http://glipho.com/johnm0307/hipaa-privacy-training-why-it-important-for-all-healthcare-entities