Late last week, the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) published guidance designed to help health care providers understand when, consistent with the HIPAA Privacy Rule, they may share information related to a patient’s mental health with others. As we have previously written, HHS seeks to balance a patient’s privacy rights in mental health records […]
Health Privacy
New CMS and OCR Rule Provides Patients with Access to Laboratory Test Results
Today, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published a final rule in the Federal Register, amending the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments of 1988 (CLIA) regulations and the HIPAA Privacy Rule to provide patients with greater access to their lab […]
HIPAA, Mental Health and the National Instant Criminal Background Check System Back in the News
Today, the US Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) publishes a proposed rule in the Federal Register by which it seeks to encourage reporting of persons with mental health bars to gun ownership/possession to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). It proposes to do so by revising the HIPAA Privacy Rule to […]
CMS Releases Updated HIPAA Security Risk Analysis Tipsheet for EHR Meaningful Use Program
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), in conjunction with the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR), has recently issued an updated tipsheet on conducting a security risk assessment for health care providers participating in CMS’s Electronic Health Records (EHR) Incentive Programs. To receive incentive payments through the program, providers must demonstrate meaningful use […]
New HHS OIG Report Raises Concerns about Oversight and Enforcement of HIPAA Security Rule
On Wednesday, December 4, 2013, the HHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a report raising concerns about the adequacy of the HHS Office for Civil Rights’ (OCR) oversight and enforcement of HIPAA’s Security Rule. The Security Rule establishes the administrative, physical, and technical safeguards that covered entities and their business associates are required to implement […]