Monthly Archives: December 2011

New HIPAA Obligations for EHR vendors and VARs are Coming

By Gary Pritts | Published: December 14, 2011
EHR Authors and Value Added Resellers (VARs) will soon have their own HIPAA obligations. At present, EHR Authors and VARs are contractually obligated by the terms of any HIPAA Business Associate Agreements (BAAs) they have signed. Soon, EHR Authors and VARs (and all other types of Business Associates) will be directly regulated by HIPAA. This [...]
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HIPAA and Facebook

By Gary Pritts | Published: December 7, 2011
Facebook, and other Social Media including Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and others are a reality of mainstream society. Employers in general, including HIPAA covered entities, are grappling with this new reality. On the one hand, social media have been proven to be a powerful vehicle to advance the aims of the organization. Social media are being [...]
Posted in County board, Developmental Disability, HIPAA, HIPAA Privacy, HIPAA Security | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

JCAHO Weighs in: “No texting of physician orders”

By Gary Pritts | Published: December 6, 2011
The Joint Commission (JCAHO) weighed in recently regarding the issue of physicians using text messages to transmit orders. They didn’t explicitly state that their opinion was related to the HIPAA regulations, but we infer that HIPAA was part of the thought process. “It is not acceptable for physicians or licensed independent practitioners to text orders [...]
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