Q: I am currently working on a social media usage policy for the organization where I work. I often notisce that some of my friends in the healthcare industry will post about patients on social media website.
In the wake of several large breaches, OCR is ready to ramp up its oversight of HIPAA compliance as it embarks upon Phase 2 of its HIPAA privacy, security, and breach notification audits. OCR began preparing for this round of audits around the same time that news broke of the second-largest HIPAA breach in the U.S., a hacking incident that affected 4.5 million patients treated at or referred to Tennessee-based Community Health Systems, Inc.
1. Phase 2 of OCR's HIPAA audits will be desk audits, which means OCR will not conduct on-site audits of covered entities (CE) and business associates (BA) unless resources are available.
The September 22, 2014, deadline to revise business associate agreements (BAA) may have seemed like a date far in the future when the HIPAA omnibus final rule was released January 25, 2013. However, this compliance date is now in our rearview mirror as we continue to move along the road toward establishing and maintaining compliance with the HIPAA Privacy Rule and Security Rule.
Q: Are there any penalties for sending an unencrypted email containing PHI to the intended recipient? Would this just be a violation of the CE's policy and not a privacy breach under HITECH?
