The Ponemon Institute has recently released its Sixth Annual Benchmark Study on Privacy & Security of Healthcare Data. The study has included business associates for the past two years. The study included information received...more
The Joint Commission, which is the national accrediting organization for health care organizations, has long banned physicians using text messages to place orders for patient care due to data security concerns. In 2011, the...more
In another case of technology out pacing the law, telemedicine has continued to push the limits of state medical professional licensure laws.
Generally, physicians and nurses must be licensed in the state in which they...more
The American Dental Association (ADA) recently mailed 37,000 credit card sized flash drives to its members that included new billing codes, entitled 2016 CDT Manual. Unfortunately, also included on the USB drive was malware...more
Consistent with the settlement the OCR agreed to with North Memorial Health Care of Minnesota, the Office for Civil Rights has settled its investigation of Raleigh Orthopaedic Clinic, P.A. (Raleigh Orthopaedic) for $750,000....more
Phishing incidents in February that may have compromised the data of 3,184 patients, including their names, dates of birth, medical record and account numbers, dates of service and medical information is causing Wyoming...more
A new report of a survey of around 30 mid-sized hospitals by the Health Information Trust Alliance (HITRUST) concludes that health care entities should be prepared for an increase in ransomware attacks in the near future....more
The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has issued its revamped audit protocol for its second phase of auditing covered entities and business associates’ compliance with the HIPAA Privacy, Security and Breach Notification Rules....more
We previously reported that 21st Century Oncology suffered a data breach affecting 2.2 million patients and has been sued in at least two class action lawsuits following notification to the patient....more
While attending the International Association of Privacy Professionals annual global event, and listening to Chairwoman Edith Ramirez discuss the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) concerns about consumer privacy, the FTC, the...more
4/8/2016
/ App Developers ,
Federal Food Drug and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ,
Health Care Providers ,
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) ,
Mobile Apps ,
Mobile Health Apps ,
OCR ,
ONC ,
PHI ,
Privacy Concerns
We previously reported that 21st Century Oncology (21st Century) experienced a data breach of up to 2.2 million patient records that compromised the names, Social Security numbers and health and diagnostic information. It...more
MedStar Health has announced that it has shut down its electronic medical record system after confirming that it has been struck with malware....more
Filed under the title of creative lawyering, a putative class action case has been filed against Facebook in federal court in Northern California alleging that health care providers and medical organizations have violated...more
The list of healthcare entities that have become (and will become) victims of ransomware is rapidly growing. The predictions from experts are that the list will grow exponentially into the future.
Last week, Methodist...more
We previously reported that several states, including Connecticut and Rhode Island, have adopted data security requirements, similar to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ data security regulations that have been in effect...more
Premier Healthcare, a multi-specialty group located in Bloomington, Illinois, announced in early March that an unencrypted laptop has been missing from its billing department since early January and started notifying affected...more
In the continuing saga of health care entities being targeted by hackers, 21st Century Oncology (21st Century) located in Fort Meyers, Florida, late last week began notifying up to 2.2 million current and former patients...more
Confirming what we are seeing in the field, the Ponemon Institute recently released a new report of a poll of 535 healthcare IT and IT security professionals that sets forth a dismal state of affairs around data security and...more
The Florida Board of Medicine has changed its Standards for Telemedicine Practice by allowing controlled substances to be prescribed through the use of telemedicine only for the treatment of psychiatric disorders.
...more
In its third release of HIPAA guidance over the past few weeks, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released“The Real HIPAA: Care Coordination, Care Planning, and Case Management Examples” to assist covered...more
In the category of “Seriously—not again?” Radiology Regional Center, located in Fort Myers, Florida, notified over 480,000 individuals and the Office for Civil Rights that their medical records, including names, dates of...more
The Office for Civil Rights has provided additional educational materials for app developers through the app developers portal that it developed last fall.
The new material is intended to assist healthcare entities and...more
Many have predicted that health care providers will continue to be targeted by hackers in the next few years. To illustrate the point, Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center has been hit hard by a ransomware...more
Pursuant to HIPAA/HITECH, covered entities are required to report breaches of unsecured protected health information that occurred in 2015 and affected less than 500 individuals to the Office for Civil Rights no later than 60...more
Centene Corporation, a health insurer headquartered in St. Louis, announced on January 25, in a press release that it is undertaking an, “ongoing comprehensive internal search for six hard drives that are unaccounted for in...more