Your patient asked you to email them a copy of their medical records, but are you allowed to do this? Is it a HIPAA violation to email medical records? Well, that really depends on the circumstances. Are You Using a HIPAA Compliant Email Provider? You may not have considered this, but the provider you use to send patient emails matters. Not all [...]
Faxing documents may seem as retro as parachute pants and gasoline that costs less than a dollar per gallon, but it is still one of the methods allowed for transmitting patient medical data. Faxage is one of the companies that offer the service and claims to be HIPAA compliant. We decided to put them to the test. What Makes a Software Tool [...]
Many patients want their healthcare providers to send them texts allowing them to access their ePHI. Does HIPAA permit this, even if the text is not secure? Yes. A patient asking for a text with this information is making the request under the HIPAA privacy rule right of access provision. “Your way, right away” carries the day here, apologies to Burger King. [...]
When HIPAA was signed into law in 1996, modernizing and streamlining medical records access goals were part of the primary focus of the law. That same year, it became possible to send faxes over the internet. Today you’re more likely to see old-style telephone fax machines in a museum than in an office. Internet faxing (or efaxing) has become the preferred choice for most businesses. [...]
Are you looking for a chatbot to help with patient communications? Using a chatbot can be an effective way to answer patient questions without having to use precious human resources. With staffing issues in healthcare, devoting an employee to run your chats can be a drain on your business. When choosing which tool is right for your business, you must ensure that the tool is HIPAA [...]
Improved technology and the recent pandemic created new opportunities for healthcare practitioners and their patients to communicate electronically. OhMD has developed a platform rich with features, including two-way texting, video visits, and patient calling. While its features may be impressive, potential users must ask, is OhMD HIPAA compliant? What Makes a Software Tool HIPAA Compliant? Regarding software, there are specific indications of [...]
Thirty years ago, copper-wire landlines connected most Americans’ phoned. Today mobile cellular and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) have marginalized the old technology. One of the better-known VoIP providers is Ooma. They provide phone services for millions of users in homes and businesses around the country. But is Ooma HIPAA compliant? What Makes a Software Tool HIPAA Compliant? When it comes to [...]
One main focus of HIPAA regulations is ensuring the privacy of the protected health information (PHI) of patients. Most people immediately think about the protection and security of PHI in physical or electronic (ePHI) formats, but what about when PHI is verbalized? Does talking about a patient violate HIPAA? If so, what precautions do healthcare providers need to take to avoid breaching [...]
Signal is an open-source free-to-use messaging app that proudly proclaims its security and privacy features. With all of these security and privacy features, the question remains: Is Signal HIPAA compliant? HIPAA Compliant Software Usage Under HIPAA, any application or software company whose product “touches” (creates, receives, maintains, or transmits) protected health information (PHI) is considered to be a business associate. For HIPAA [...]
One of the longest-lasting impacts of the pandemic may be the creation and adoption of alternative communications methods in the healthcare arena. An HHS study released in December 2021 showed 2020 telehealth usage for Medicare patients increased 63-fold over 2019 (840,000 to 52.7 million). Regardless of the method used, communications such as cloud-based VoIP, telehealth, texting, and email in healthcare must comply [...]
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