The Need for HIPAA Complaint Medical Billing Software
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996
(HIPAA) includes seven sets of rules that will affect your
practice. The Department of Health and Human Services, or DHHS,
issues these in the form of the "Notice of Proposed Rule Making"
or NPRM. Every practice, regardless of size, must comply with
HIPAA privacy, security and transactional regulations. Moreover,
adherence to all subsequent regulations is also required. This
covers most everything in your practice, including your medical
billing software.
When you are shopping for medical billing software, ask how and
for whom the system was designed, and whether the data will be
safe and secure on backed-up, protected, HIPAA-compliant servers
accessible only to authorized persons. Look for companies who
provide free updates to ensure continued efficiency and HIPAA
compliance. The new HIPAA standards require huge changes to how
healthcare organizations deal with their patient information,
including coding, security, patient record management,
reimbursement and care management. HIPAA's provisions include
stringent codes for the unvarying transfer of electronic data,
including routine alterations and billing.
Clearly your approach to HIPAA medical billing software must
include a serious investigation of software security. Most
computer experts will agree that there is no such thing as
absolute computer or software security, so working closely with
your HIPAA software providers to help determine data
deficiencies is a good idea. HIPAA Complaint Medical Billing
Software can be easily expanded to meet future needs, and can be
targeted directly to the size and complexity of your practice.
Options for new HIPAA compliant software have never been better,
as there is unlimited scalability, a wide range of customization
choices, and a large selection of useful features that will
prevent the patients' privacy from being compromised.
Innovations in the technology of medical billing software have
created a new criterion for digital precision. Make certain that
the HIPAA compliant medical software packager you chose includes
all finalized aspects of HIPAA to guarantee full compliance with
HIPAA standards as they relate to the electronic transfer of
protected health information. The regulations themselves took
effect in February 2003, and affect every medical practice in
the United States. Effective April 2005, HIPAA mandates security
measures to physically and electronically secure electronic
protected health information (PHI) against unauthorized
retrieval, reliably store the electronic data, and provide for
emergency access to the data.
Since most medical billing software packages are now designed to
be HIPAA compliant, it is just a matter of choosing the right
software for your practice, and your medical billing software
will run as smoothly and efficiently as ever.