The University of Washington Medicine (“UWM”) has agreed to settle charges that it violated the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”) Security Rule for US$ 750,000, following a breach report first submitted by UWM on November 27, 2013. In addition to settlement, UWM has entered into a Resolution Agreement with the United States Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”), Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) and has entered into and agreed to comply with a Corrective Action Plan (“CAP”).
HHS offers HIPAA compliance resource for mobile app developers
On October 5, 2015, the HHS Office of Civil Rights (OCR) unveiled a new resource to provide mobile health (mHealth) developers guidance on complying with Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requirements applicable to those organizations. The portal permits…
HHS reports detail HIPAA breaches and compliance
On June 11, 2014, the US Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) issued two reports to Congress addressing Health Information Accountability and Portability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”) compliance activities for calendar years 2011 and 2012. The first report, relating…
Two New York hospitals agree to pay $4.8M in HIPAA fines
On May 7th, two New York hospitals agreed to pay the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) $4.8 million dollars to settle claims that the hospitals had failed to secure patients’ electronic protected health information, in violation of the…
Two HIPAA settlement agreements illustrate need for encryption
On April 22, 2014, the US Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) Office of Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced that it had reached settlement agreements with two organizations alleged to have violated the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act of…
Government’s Fraud and Abuse Program nets US$4.3Bn in FY 2013
In a report released on February 26th, the federal government stated that its Heath Care Fraud and Abuse Control Program (“HCFAC”), established under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”), recovered $4.3 billion during FY…