[ Friday, September 25, 2009 ]
Business Associate Agreements: The HITECH provisions of HIPAA contain some big changes for business associates, as well as some changes to business associate agreements. But the specifics aren't that well defined. What should you do? Should you amend your existing BAAs? Should you adopt a new form of BAA for new relationships, but keep the existing form to see what happens?
Well, according to Susan McAndrew, OCR's deputy director for health information privacy, HHS is drafting rules that specify what need to go into your BAAs. My advice so far has been to wait; maybe you should adopt some new, relatively generic references to the new HITECH provisions and put them into your standard form BAA, but don't worry about amending your existing BAAs. I'm sticking with that advice.
Jeff [10:18 PM]
[ Thursday, September 24, 2009 ]
New York: Here's
a story (subscription required) about a NY scam similar to the Miami scam mentioned Tuesday. A lawyer and seven employees of a public hospital were arrested for running a scam where medical information of auto accident victims was taken by the hospital employees and sold to the lawyer, who used the information to file personal injury suits and get the patients unnecessary care at clinics that were part of the scam. The scam works particularly well in "no-fault" auto insurance states like NY.
Jeff [9:26 AM]
Social Media in Healthcare: I'll be speaking again next year at Q1 Production's 2nd Annual
Healthcare New Media Marketing Conference, this time in Chicago. June 14-15, 2010. I'll be discussing the legal implications of using social media in healthcare, particularly in healthcare marketing.
On that note,
here's a story about a hospital system and a physician recruiting agency using Facebook and Twitter to pursue their physician recruiting efforts. To paraphrase Willie Sutton, you gotta market where the customers are.
Jeff [9:16 AM]
[ Tuesday, September 22, 2009 ]
Twitter: Here's a
Good Question. Answer: not if there's no PHI. Tweets are very short; most wouldn't be identifiable.
Jeff [6:11 PM]
More Miami Misappropriation: I think this is a spill-over and an addition of new parties to a previous story, but a Miami cosmetician has pled guilty to buying medical records for resale to a plaintiff's lawyer, who would solicit the patients to become his clients.
Like one of the commentators says, it's 99% of the lawyers that give the rest a bad name.
Jeff [11:17 AM]
[ Thursday, September 17, 2009 ]
Off Topic: Health Reform: Interesting article.
Jeff [12:16 PM]
[ Monday, September 14, 2009 ]
Cool: I'm a
top 25 blog for nursing assistants and CNAs.
Jeff [3:41 PM]
[ Wednesday, September 09, 2009 ]
Business Associate compliance: As you know, HITECH added a layer of responsibility onto business associates, so they are effectively treated as covered entities for many purposes. This means covered entities and business associates need to beef up their compliance efforts.
Here are some more goodies from Dom Nicastro on where you can start.
Jeff [8:58 AM]
[ Friday, September 04, 2009 ]
Physician trends and information: This is a pretty fascinating study from the Center for Studying Health System Change on current statistics relative to US physicians. 3/4 of practicing doctors are white; 3/4 are male; about half of doctor revenue comes from Medicare and Medicaid; most doctors provide some charity care to financially strapped patients, with the charity care rates going up with the income of the doctor and the years in practice. 4 out of 5 doctors work 40 hours per week or more. 90% of doctors are board certified. 1/3 of doctors make $150,000 per year or less, and 1/3 make over $250,000. Of all the major medical specialties, pediatricians are the most satisfied with their careers.
I could go on all day; check out the report yourself.
Jeff [10:40 AM]
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