How Healthcare Compliance Software Can Help Your Practice

One item you must pay attention to is maintaining compliance with the various regulations imposed by the government. You’re subject to the standards set by an alphabet soup of federal, state, and local agencies. One way to bring order to this bureaucratic barrage is by using healthcare compliance software. Because virtually all healthcare providers have to comply with HIPAA, here are a few things to consider when choosing HIPAA healthcare compliance management software.

Healthcare Compliance Software – Does it Help You Completely Satisfy the Regulation?

The first and most important consideration when selecting healthcare regulatory compliance software is (obviously) whether it does what it is supposed to. HIPAA rules and regulations are binary–you are either compliant or not. There’s no partial credit, and you must prove what you have done to achieve compliance.

There are thousands of pages of regulations, guidelines, and caveats on the HHS.gov website. Your healthcare compliance software should address all of them in a way that takes the unique circumstances of your organization into account.

At a minimum, effective HIPAA healthcare compliance management software should include the following:

• Conducting Security Risk Assessments
• Gap Identification and Mitigation
• Effective HIPAA Policies and Procedures
• Employee Training and Attestation
• Management of Business Associates and Business Associate Agreements
• Breach Reporting, Anonymous Whistleblower Processes, and Effective Disaster Recovery and Response Plans

Healthcare Compliance Software – Does it Organize and Remind You of Important Tasks/Dates

Compliance is more than just a one-and-done event. Instead, it’s more of a snapshot of a moment in time. HIPAA training for employees must be conducted every year. Security risk assessments must be done annually and more often if you’ve made any changes to your physical and data security infrastructure. Even something as simple as adding a new software application or printer should trigger a new security risk assessment.

Healthcare compliance software should help you manage all the moving parts that make up an effective HIPAA compliance program. It should remind you of when annual training and assessments must occur and help you track their progress.  

Healthcare Compliance Software – Does it Save Time?

HIPAA compliance is a challenging process for most people. The law is intentionally vague because it applies to organizations ranging in size from a one-person office to a regional health center with thousands of employees and patients.

It can take weeks or even months to achieve HIPAA compliance. Effective regulatory compliance software should provide tools and information to streamline that process in a way that does not compromise compliance in any way.

Healthcare Compliance Software – Does it Help You Respond When There is a Problem?

Despite your best efforts at achieving healthcare compliance, sometimes, things that require a response will happen. Employees may send protected health information (PHI) to the wrong patient. Maybe a business associate is victimized by cybercriminals, and your PHI was stolen.

Healthcare compliance software should help you respond in an appropriate manner to limit your organizational liability. Under HIPAA, there should be tools to assist you with breach reporting or responding to an audit by the Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights investigators.

HIPAA Healthcare Compliance Software – Solved

If your organization struggles with HIPAA compliance, our automated healthcare compliance software, “The Guard,” meets all of the above standards. It comprehensively addresses every aspect of HIPAA compliance for your organization in a way that satisfies the law’s “good-faith effort” standard.

It organizes ongoing requirements like training and HIPAA security risk assessments into simple tasks that you can track. It has a customizable set of policies and procedures prepared by compliance attorneys that are audit-tested.

Users of “The Guard” report that they achieve compliance 80 percent faster than without it. The Guard also has all the reporting functionality you would need just in case the worst happens, and you face a breach.