QUESTION: What is HIPAA and how will it impact my practice?

ANSWER:  The new privacy and confidentiality rules required by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, the so-called HIPAA statute, involves a new set of federal privacy and confidentiality regulations that will apply to health plans, health care clearinghouses, and health care providers including doctors of chiropractic. This law was intended by Congress to protect health records and confidential patient information from being sold, misused or otherwise inappropriately transferred without patient consent, for example from large HMOs or insurance companies to banks and credit bureaus.  The current published information from The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) indicate that covered providers must be in compliance by April 14, 2003.  This new law will also require all chiropractic practices to have a compliance plan for "electronic healthcare transactions" in place by October 16, 2003, in which providers will need to address a variety of key procedural questions relating to the security of patient data.  To help understand the kind of questions that are involved, HHS has developed a series of on-line resources.  First, take the HIPAA quiz at the link below.  Please note that this quiz is for all doctor-level providers and some of the questions have to do with prescriptions so don't take offense.  This information is, however, a good depiction of the far-reaching nature of the HIPAA rules.