The Ups and Downs Of HIPAA

Brief Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography

Literature Review for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act

The health insurance portability and accountability act were created in 1996 in order to prevent people's private health information from being misused or hacked and to protect them. HIPAA Was implemented into legislation to develop regulations on a national level to keep people's information private. All healthcare organizations must be HIPAA compliant and must provide training to all health care workers. The explanation is because this protects the integrity and confidentiality of patients. (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Updated 2020 Mar 29)

HIPAA has five sections to the bill. The first section aids employees with protection from them losing health care coverage if they lose a job or relocate. It also prevents new health insurance plans from denying people healthcare coverage who have pre-existing medical conditions. The second section of HIPAA is defined as the prevention of fraudulent activity from insurance companies an abuse. This section is called the medical a medical liability reform an administration's implication section. The second section of the act implement policies for national standards for EMR healthcare transactions, standards for healthcare organizations/ providers, and health care coverage. (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Updated 2020 Mar 29)

The third section of HIPAA has policies for pretax medical funding accounts an implement updates to health insurance legislation and decreases and health care coverage. The 4th section includes guidelines for health care insurance pop plans that cover my suitable persons and incorporates revised updates for health care insurance. The 5th section of the act old business owned life insurance plans and policies. Section 5 creates new revised guidelines for treating people who are not AUS citizen and people who have re appealed financial role to new allocation rules of interest. (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Updated 2020 Mar 29)

There are other reasons why HIPAA was put into legislation. The first was to develop confidential systems for all health care facilities, organizations, and beyond health care period the second main factor for emblem imitation for the act was to ensure the protection of health information and to ensure health information privacy. According to (Tariq, R. A., & Hackert, P. B. (2018) The range of persons to be covered by HIPAA are:

Every healthcare workers

Students

Insurance companies

Billing Companies

EMR companies

People who do not work with patients directly

The simple objectives of HIPAA according to (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Updated 2020 Mar 29) are to decrease the use of health care information two people who do not need to know such data. And to provide penalties to non-compliant persons who do not keep information confidential. The specific health information that falls into the act the hi PA category would be all medical/ health care information especially identifier data such as name or Social Security number and other personal data.

There are some legal exemptions to the act which are victims of abuse, victims of violent crimes, elder abuse, an infectious disease/ reported or reportable disease. The data examples to be protected are all written documents, EMR data being transferred outside healthcare organizations, and data on hard drives.

The history of HIPAA since 1996 to 2016 over a twenty-year period has included many revisions and add-ons to the act, the new revisions are more invasive that previous sections of the act and have problem areas. According to (Mellen, M. (2016) in 2000 (Privacy Regulation)

But the privacy regulation it decreases the number of times covered entities can utilize protected healthcare information and what situations this can occur in.

2003 (Security Regulation)

What the security regulation it implements the national standards and integrity for electronic medical records.

2009 (HITECH)

This includes in-depth provisions for HIPAA in covered organizations. This section updates penalties to include civil and criminal liability for privacy, develop and also develops more strict violations which would be regulations for security and stronger enforcement updated amount of use of protected health care information to be used for marketing and fund-raising purposes which means you are limited to only using healthcare information a few times for marketing. The criminal violations for HIPAA are increased. All covered HIPAA organizations must report any and all security informational breaches.

2013 (Omnibus Regulation)

This revision develops extensions and limits for HIPAA. This section also amends the administrative implications and extends patient rights to restrict accesses and allows for more accesses for themselves to their HIM.

In summary, what we have learned from HIPAA is that the policies and regulations were put into place to protect our citizens from their personal information from being breached, but also that The US political system has once again been a big influence, others believe that it was for their own gain. The new revisions have been excessive others may say unnecessary. Providers argue that the new revisions make it quite difficult to treat patients especially some with societal problems like child abuse because of the very restrictive access for them to the patients for the patients' medical history. The lag times a constant signing in an out of a more software due to HIPAA guidelines creates another obstacle of treating patients quicker and of course there is always the cost of such EMR software, and technical issues that come with EMR software. The problems of logging on and off for providers and clinics creates issues with quality care for patients because then patients have to wait longer in their appointment to be seen. The other issue that comes with EMR software that is mandated through HIPAA affects quality of care because it can cause medical errors when treating patients and create poor quality of care. When there are only two problems with EMR systems it causes errors like wrong medication request being sent to patients' pharmacy. The cost of electronic medical record software can create issues eventually for patients because of providers would have to balance the healthcare cost somewhere and it is creates higher cost for cash paying patients.

Annotated Bibliography

Reference #1

(Annas, G. J. (2003). HIPAA regulations-a new era of medical-record privacy? New England Journal of Medicine, 348(15), 1486-1490)

According to (Annas, G. J. 2003) this Journal addresses HIPAA and the regulations of HIPAA as being strenuous on providers and states that the policies of the act do more harm than good because they do not help the person rather than makes it more difficult to actually protect health information. The author explains that HIPAA does not set a clear national standard whatsoever because the regulations themselves are so in-depth mixed with constant changing inconsistencies with the policies.

Strengths:

Offers insight regarding topics from an actual healthcare provider and is

very on point, honest, and provides helpful information for HIPAA.

Weaknesses:

Some redundancy in the article.

Relevancy:

The article is very relevant to the topic being addressed because it proves the answer to the question which is how did HIPAA affect patient quality of care in clinics? The article answers the question by developing almost impossible policies for providers to follow and in some cases not helping to protect patient privacy at all.

Reference #2

(English, A., & Ford, C. A. (2004). The HIPAA privacy rule and adolescents: Legal questions and clinical challenges. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, 36(2), 80-6. doi:http://dx.doi.org.proxy.cecybrary.com/10.1111/j.1931-2393.2004.tb00012.x)

This medical Journal discusses the right for minors who are receiving surface is services had a Planned Parenthood facility with HIPAA have the right for their information to not be disclosed to their parents even though they're not over 18 any minor however, in some cases depending on the facility parents can obtain such records.

Strengths:

Discuss this privacy section of HIPAA well

has great information on the subject of minors being able to seek medical help when sexually active without parental consent or involvement read the article also discusses that most young adult adults will not get help with the clinics talked about above if parents were to have access to their health care information.

Weaknesses:

Not substantial to the question being addressed.

Relevancy:

This article was not really relevant to the specific topic question. However, I did learn a new thing regarding HIPAA that young in emancipated unemancipated adults can get treatment for STD's and such without parental consent in some cases and HIPAA does create a new challenge from this happening.

Reference #3

(Terry, N. P. (2001). A health diptych: The impact of privacy regulation on medical error and malpractice litigation. American Journal of Law and Medicine, 27(4), 361-419. Retrieved from https://proxy.cecybrary.com/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.proxy.cecybrary.com/scholarly-journals/ehealth-diptych-impact-privacy-regulation-on/docview/274663702/se-2?accountid=144789)

This article went over the connection with patient privacy and medical errors. The author explained that sometimes health care regulations can affect malpractice laws because some privacy regulations are too strict creating problems for the provider because it develops issues with consent to treat in some cases it is difficult to get informed consent to treat.

Strengths:

The author elaborates on the structure of HIPAA.

Weaknesses:

None to list.

Relevancy:

The article is relevant to the topic because in the article the author states that politics do play a big part of health care policy and this should not occur because it can cause other issues with malpractice-based risk. The article also shows evidence of what I addressed earlier that the stringent policies and revised sections of HIPAA can affect the overall patient quality of care because if it is HIPAA if HIPAA makes it difficult for providers to receive informed consent then some patients will suffer from not being able to get medical treatment.

Reference #4

(Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Health Research and the Privacy of Health Information: The HIPAA Privacy Rule; Nass SJ, Levit LA, Gostin LO, editors. Beyond the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Enhancing Privacy, Improving Health Through Research. Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US); 2009. 4, HIPAA, the Privacy Rule, and Its Application to Health Research. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9573/)

This article from (National Academies Press (US); 2009) addresses that there are some issues with researchers being able to do medical research with human subjects because of the privacy rules implemented through HIPAA. This article also states there are disparities between federal and government regulations, and the common role for researchers. The article also points out such disparities and recommends HHS to develop new revisions to resolve the issue.

Strengths:

Explains importance of researchers being able to conduct medical research with less restrictions and to allow common rule.

Weaknesses:

Does not go into very great detail about the disparities.

Relevancy:

this article is not relevant to my topic. However, it is vital to the overall conflict of how some of the HIPAA regulations affect many healthcare organizations are making it difficult to get consent in order to aid people in the healthcare sector.

Reference #5

(Asfaw, E. (2008). Health insurance portability and accountability act (HIPAA): Confidentiality and privacy from the perspectives of the consumer and the physician (Order No. 3303726). Available from ProQuest One Academic. (304831007). Retrieved from https://proxy.cecybrary.com/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.proxy.cecybrary.com/dissertations-theses/health-insurance-portability-accountability-act/docview/304831007/se-2?accountid=144789)

Last article or dissertation I reviewed discuss is the implementation of HIPAA through a provider point of view and a patient POV. The research suggests that yes, it is vital to protect patient information there may be affects to the overall quality of care because when some medical information is withheld it does not allow for healthcare organizations to access medical information in order to improve the health care field. There are medical researchers and quality insurance assurance people who need access to certain medical outcomes and information so the data can be analyzed and then trends, or standards can be implemented in order to improve the health care system. The other aspect to the author discusses is the importance of public health services to obtain healthcare information in order to improve public health and develop solutions for societal issues.

strengths:

Addressed his concerns with HIPAA.

elaborates that in some cases HIPAA does create a barrier to improve quality of care.

Weaknesses:

None to list.

Relevancy:

the dissertation is most relevant to the topic because it indicates the importance of some healthcare information being accessible to some healthcare organizations because without this information how can we improve quality in the healthcare sector? and how do we analyze data we cannot obtain?

Conclusion of annotated Bibliography:

There are many potential findings with the annotated bibliography that were identified. The first substantial finding was that in the first reference where the author discusses several inconsistencies with the act making it difficult to follow. The other important finding was that the HIPAA has discrepancies in providing protection of healthcare information and creating more stress on providers having access issues with patient information thus making wait times increase for patients. Reference is substantial because the findings with the research indicates the obstacles public health entities have on access with healthcare information. When public health entities have difficulties with getting data to analyze than public health interties cannot form solutions for societal issues like chemical dependency and such providing extreme consequences with quality of care and care in general for patients. The third reference the findings from the third reference also proves to be substantial because it shows the discrepancies with how healthcare policies is influenced by politics and also the article goes over how strict some of the HIPAA revisions are in making it difficult to get informed consent.

References

1. Asfaw, E. (2008). Health insurance portability and accountability act (HIPAA): Confidentiality and privacy from the perspectives of the consumer and the physician (Order No. 3303726). Available from ProQuest One Academic. (304831007). Retrieved from https://proxy.cecybrary.com/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.proxy.cecybrary.com/dissertations-theses/health-insurance-portability-accountability-act/docview/304831007/se-2?accountid=144789

2. Annas, G. J. (2003). HIPAA regulations-a new era of medical-record privacy? New England Journal of Medicine, 348(15), 1486-1490

3. Edemekong PF, Annamaraju P, Haydel MJ. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. [Updated 2020 Mar 29]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2020 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK500019/

4. English, A., & Ford, C. A. (2004). The HIPAA privacy rule and adolescents: Legal questions and clinical challenges. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, 36(2), 80-6. doi:http://dx.doi.org.proxy.cecybrary.com/10.1111/j.1931-2393.2004.tb00012.x

5. Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Health Research and the Privacy of Health Information: The HIPAA Privacy Rule; Nass SJ, Levit LA, Gostin LO, editors. Beyond the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Enhancing Privacy, Improving Health Through Research. Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US); 2009. 4, HIPAA, the Privacy Rule, and Its Application to Health Research. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9573/

6. Mellen, M. (2016). HIPAA turns 20: Why it?s an effective law for healthcare. Health Data Management (Online), Retrieved from https://proxy.cecybrary.com/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.proxy.cecybrary.com/trade-journals/hipaa-turns-20-why-s-effective-law-healthcare/docview/1911988679/se-2?accountid=1

7. Tariq, R. A., & Hackert, P. B. (2018). Patient confidentiality.