On September 23, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that Care New England Health System (CNEHS) agreed to pay $400,000 and enter into a corrective action plan...more
On August 18, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”), Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced plans to expand its investigations of reported breaches of the Health Insurance Portability and...more
On August, 4, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that Advocate Health Care Network (Advocate) agreed to pay a settlement amount of $5.55 million and adopt a...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced two settlements of more than $2 million each with respect to alleged violations of the Health Insurance Portability and...more
There appears to be momentum on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC to modify and/or repeal the Ethics in Patient Referrals Act of 1989, more commonly known as the Stark Law, which was enacted to curb overutilization of certain...more
On July 11, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) issued guidance (the “Guidance”) for health care entities relating to ransomware and the Health Insurance Portability and...more
On June 30, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced that a business associate providing management services to nursing homes in the Philadelphia, Pa. region agreed to...more
During the week of April 18, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced two significant settlements with a large New York City hospital and a North Carolina orthopaedic...more
4/26/2016
/ Business Associates ,
Covered Entities ,
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Film Industry ,
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) ,
Hospitals ,
OCR ,
Patient Privacy Rights ,
PHI ,
Prior Authorization ,
Public Disclosure ,
Settlement
On March 21, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”), announced the launch of the 2016 Phase 2 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”) Audit...more
On March 17, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced that the Feinstein Institution for Medical Research (“Feinstein”) agreed to pay $3.9 million to resolve...more
On March 16, 2016, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced that North Memorial Health Care of Minnesota (“Memorial”) agreed to pay $1.55 million to resolve allegations that...more
The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services’ (“HHS”) Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) and the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) were each involved in the resolution of high profile privacy matters in January 2016. The two...more
In the February 12, 2016 Federal Register, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published a final rule (Final Rule) with respect to reporting and returning overpayments by Medicare Part A and Part B providers to...more
In the February 12, 2016 Federal Register, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published a final rule (Final Rule) with respect to reporting and returning overpayments by Medicare Part A and Part B providers to...more
For those covered entities who experienced one or more HIPAA breaches involving less than 500 individuals during the calendar year 2015, the deadline for reporting those breaches to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of...more
The January 6, 2016 Federal Register included a final rule (“Final Rule”) amending the HIPAA Privacy Rule to expressly permit certain “covered entities” to disclose to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System...more
On December 14, 2015, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced a $750,000 settlement with the University of Washington (UW). This is the third HIPAA settlement announced by OCR...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Civil Rights (OCR), has announced a settlement with Lahey Hospital and Medical Center (Lahey) that arose out of a HIPAA breach involving a stolen laptop. The...more
In November 2015, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released its investigative plans for fiscal year 2016 (the OIG Work Plan). The OIG Work Plan highlights more...more
On Thursday, October 29, 2015, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) and the Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) jointly issued a rule (the “Final Rule”) to finalize five (5) waivers of certain fraud and abuse...more
11/5/2015
/ ACOs ,
Anti-Kickback Statute ,
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ,
Civil Monetary Penalty ,
Federal Register ,
Final Rules ,
Gainsharing ,
Healthcare ,
Healthcare Fraud ,
Interim Rule ,
Kickbacks ,
Medicaid ,
Medicare ,
Medicare Shared Savings Program ,
OIG ,
Self-Referral ,
Shared Savings Program ,
Stark Law
On September 29, 2015, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) released two reports that reviewed the Office of Civil Rights’ (OCR) enforcement of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). The...more
On September 2, 2015, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ("HHS") announced that it had entered into a Settlement Agreement with an Indiana-based medical practice for alleged violations of the Health Insurance...more
9/4/2015
/ Breach Notification Rule ,
Compliance ,
Covered Entities ,
Cyber Attacks ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Breach ,
Data Security ,
De-Identified Protected Health Information ,
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ,
Health Care Providers ,
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) ,
Healthcare ,
Personally Identifiable Information ,
PHI ,
Popular ,
Privacy Policy ,
Settlement Agreements
St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center (SEMC), a tertiary care hospital based in Brighton, Mass., agreed to pay $218,400 to address deficiencies in its HIPAA compliance activities. The SEMC settlement continues a pattern of...more
On June 25, 2015, the United States Supreme Court (the "Court"), in the high-profile decision of King v. Burwell, upheld the availability of tax credits under the Affordable Care Act ("ACA") for individuals purchasing health...more
6/29/2015
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) ,
Health Insurance ,
Health Insurance Exchanges ,
Healthcare Reform ,
King v Burwell ,
Public Health Insurance Marketplace ,
SCOTUS ,
State Health Insurance Exchanges ,
Subsidies ,
Tax Credits
On June 9, 2015, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (OIG) published a one-page fraud alert entitled, "Physician Compensation Arrangements May Result in Significant Liability." This is the...more