Texting and E-mail with Patients - Meeting Patient Desires Within the HIPAA Rules

This HIPAA compliance training will explain how HIPAA requirements for privacy and security can be reconciled with patient requests for information to be provided by e-mail and text messages.

Why Should You Attend:

E-mail and texting present new challenges to health care providers, as there are simultaneously new requirements to share information with patients, and a new enforcement effort to ensure the privacy and security of Protected Health Information (PHI). Meeting both challenges requires careful consideration of all the regulations and technologies, as well as patient preferences and work flow.

This webinar will focus on the rights of individuals to communicate in the manner they desire, and how a medical office can decide what is an acceptable process for communications with individuals. The session will explain how to discuss communications options with individuals so that you can best meet their needs and desires, while preserving their rights under the rules.

This training session will discuss the requirements, the risks, and the issues of the increasing use of e-mail and texting for patient and provider communications and provide a road map for how to use them safely and effectively, to increase the quality of health care and patient satisfaction. In addition, the session will discuss how to be prepared for the eventuality that there is a breach, so that compliance can be assured.

The session will describe the information security compliance process, how it works, and how it can help you decide how to integrate e-mail and texting into your organization in a compliant way. The process, including the use of information security risk analysis, will be explained, and the policies needed to support the process will be described.

Areas Covered in this Webinar:

• Find out ways in which patients want to use e-mail and texting to communicate with providers, and how providers want to use e-mail and texting to enable better patient care.
• Learn what are the risks of using e-mail and texting, what can go wrong, and what can result when it does.
• Find out about HIPAA requirements for access and patient preferences, as well as the requirements to protect PHI.
• Learn how to use an information security management process to evaluate risks and make decisions about how best to protect PHI and meet patient needs and desires.
• Find out what policies and procedures you should have in place for dealing with e-mail and texting, as well as any new technology.
• Learn about the training and education that must take place to ensure your staff uses e-mail and texting properly and does not risk exposure of PHI.
• Find out the steps that must be followed in the event of a breach of PHI.
• Learn about how the HIPAA audit and enforcement activities are now being increased and what you need to do to survive a HIPAA audit.

Who Will Benefit:

• This webinar will provide valuable assistance to all personnel in medical offices, practice groups, hospitals, academic medical centers, insurers, business associates (shredding, data storage, systems vendors, billing services, etc.). The titles are
• Compliance Director
• CEO
• CFO
• Privacy Officer
• Security Officer
• Information Systems Manager
• HIPAA Officer
• Compliance Officer
• Chief Information Officer
• Health Information Manager
• Healthcare Counsel/Lawyer
• Office Manager
• Contracts Manager