What is HIPPA
**Privacy is one of the biggest concerns when it comes to healthcare. To protect it ,The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) was issued as a federal law in the US that requires the creation of national standards to protect sensitive patient health information from being disclosed without the patient’s consent or knowledge. It is a really important law that prohibits anyone from sharing secret patient information to data collecting companies. The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued the HIPAA Privacy Rule to implement the requirements of HIPAA. The HIPAA Security Rule protects a subset of information covered by the Privacy Rule.
HIPPA in software development
HIPAA-compliant software is any healthcare application for the healthcare industry that includes all the privacy and safety measures stipulated by the federal law of 1996, HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) regulation. This requires apps to follow HIPPA compliances when collecting patient data. Any kind of software that is aimed at providing solutions related to healthcare needs to be tested and assessed to ensure that its features and functionality comply with HIPAA since failure or inadequacy in doing so would result in serious legal consequences. This is the reason why most healthcare software development companies follow hipaa compliances and focus on the establishment of best practices for developing HIPAA-compliant software.
What is the benefits of Hippa for patients and providers
Hippa is one of the most beneficial regulation, it results in 3 basic benefits for the users
Ensures patient data integrity: Securing the Patient Protected Health Information (PHI) is the basic reason for bringing HIPPA. PHI contains data about existing health problems, immunizations, allergies, history of substance abuse, and so much more that a person would never like to share. Doctors need to access this data to know about a patient's condition before they can prescribe a test or medication.
Prevention of liability: According to federal law a breach of patients' secret health information can cause legal consequences for healthcare providers. This is also applicable if a software application causes or facilitates data losses, whether directly or indirectly, the company that developed it could also face stern legal action. This is the reason why most companies these days focus too much on Hippa
Stakeholder trust: Since HIPAA is a federal law, Stakeholders cannot take the risk of investing on something that would deny it. Whether it is a provider organization, an insurance payer, or even patients using a software platform, the knowledge of HIPAA compliance for software development builds up faith in HealthTech security.
Requirement of HIPPA
Hippa is not a single function that you can apply to make it compliant to the guidelines. It is a set of standards, rules, amendments, and legislation outlined by HIPAA. Here are few thing to keep in mind when building app with HIPPA
Hippa Privacy rule
These are the most basic guidelines that were established to safeguard the use and disclosure of medical records to enhance the flow of health data while preventing fraud and theft.
HIPPA security rule
The Security Rule mandates regulations to protect ePHI generated, received, used, or maintained by covered entities. But hey, HIPAA doesn't always give specific rules, but people usually look to the NIST guide for help with following HIPAA.
Hippa enforcement rule
This Rule outlines the procedures that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) follows to enforce HIPAA regulations.
Conclusion
HIPAA compliant software development is essential in order to protect institutional healthcare data and avoid steep regulatory fees. In 2020 alone, 26.4 million medical records were breached, and already in 2023, more than 540 organizations reported health data breaches affecting more than 112 million people. It’s better to get ahead of the game and design systems with HIPAA requirements and security in mind.
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