A federal $25,000 HIPAA settlement with a clinical laboratory is significant because it calls for a wide-ranging corrective action plan. And the enforcement action is unusual because it’s the result of a compliance review of a covered entity not directly tied to the data breach that triggered the investigation. Under the settlement, Peachstate Health Management LLC, a Georgia-based clinical laboratory company, must implement comprehensive reforms of its HIPAA Security Rule compliance program and designate an […]

The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) this week announced a settlement with Peachstate Health Management LLC (aka AEON Clinical Laboratories) following a compliance review that uncovered alleged violations of HIPAA. The settlement includes a $25,000 payment to OCR by Peachstate, a corrective action plan, and three years of monitoring by OCR. OCR initiated a compliance review of Peachstate in December 2017 to determine its compliance with HIPAA following a report of a data breach by […]

Asking someone about their COVID-19 vaccination status can be a touchy subject. While some are happy to chat about being vaccinated, others want to keep that information private. Some, including Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, have claimed that being asked about their vaccination status is a HIPAA violation. But others have said that’s not actually true. So what’s really going on here? Read on for what you need to know. What is HIPAA, again? You’re […]

Pandemic pressures, alongside staff fatigue and stress, are the most likely causes of a “high incidence” of sharps injuries among nurses in the past year, a report from the Royal College of Nursing has suggested. The fact that not all nurses have access to safer sharps or appropriate training and education could also be a contributing factor, said the report, which is based on responses from more than 7,500 RCN members. The report, called Blood […]

Private companies are developing vaccine passports, and businesses across the U.S. are debating whether to mandate them. The following articles on vaccine passports have been published by Becker’s Hospital Review: Fauci: US won’t mandate vaccine passports Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told Politico‘s “Dispatch” podcast that the federal government will not mandate COVID-19 vaccine passports for businesses or events, but private companies will decide whether they adopt […]

The first thing you should know about HIPAA is that it’s HIPAA, not HIPPA. There is only one P, and that P doesn’t stand for “privacy.” “People make up what that acronym stands for,” Deven McGraw, co-founder and chief regulatory officer of the medical records platform Ciitizen and former deputy director for health information privacy at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR), told Recode. “More often than not, […]

The mission of why healthcare exists is to heal and restore health, but that can be difficult to accomplish if the built environment is not designed with security in mind. A safe environment is a major contributor to healing, yet violence generated by patients and visitors is increasing at astonishing rates. Improving security and safety in healthcare begins with design. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while under 20% of all workplace injuries happen […]

Hospitals are the most common violators of HIPAA privacy regulations, followed by private practices, outpatient facilities, pharmacies and health plans, according to a March 3 report from the American Medical Association. HHS’ Office for Civil Rights, which is responsible for enforcing HIPAA privacy rules, regularly tracks the compliance issues most often alleged in HIPAA complaints. The five most common HIPAA compliance issues, as compiled by the HHS’ Office for Civil Rights: Impermissible uses and disclosures […]

The $65,000 settlement with Arbour Hospital is the seventeenth made by OCR under its HIPAA Right of Access Initiative, an agency compliance priority. The Department of Health and Human Services announced it reached a $65,000 settlement with Massachusetts-based Arbour Hospital, which resolved potential violations of the HIPAA right of access standard. It’s the seventeenth enforcement action taken under the OCR’s Right of Access Initiative. Launched in 2019 as an agency enforcement priorit, the effort is designed […]

The deadly gunfire that erupted at a Minnesota medical clinic earlier this month sharpened the pangs of a Louisiana man’s grief even as it hardened his resolve to better protect health care workers from workplace violence. Gene Sausse owns a small business in New Orleans. He’s also the brother of a nurse who died almost two years ago in Baton Rouge from injuries sustained on the job. When a patient attacked another nurse, Lynne Sausse […]