• E-mail
• Print
• RSS

HIPAA Update blog question: How do you handle restriction requests on third party billers?

HIPAA Weekly Advisor, March 22, 2010

Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to HIPAA Weekly Advisor!

A HIPAA compliance officer posted the following questions regarding HIPAA compliance on HCPro’s HIPAA Update blog. To weigh in, go to the blog post.

How is your entity handling third-party billers in terms of patient’s requests for restrictions?

We have added a new insurance plan (self-pay restricted) and require patients to sign a form that explains to them that their request only applies to HOSPITAL or CLINIC controlled billing. Third-party billers such as radiologists and physicians must be contacted separately, which really undermines the intent of the law.

In an unrelated issue…

We have had an increase in patients bringing in their own portable media (thumbdrives, CDs, DVDs) instead of paper medical records. How is your organization handling:

1. Accessing and storing the data on the media for patient care
2. Patient requests to add your organizations medical record and/or image to the patient’s portable media

Our organization is requiring that all portable media except radiology images be scanned by our staff for viruses before being printed or saved to a secure drive.

As for patient requests to “add to” their own portable media, we will not. We will burn a fresh CD that we know is clean instead.

I would be interested to hear others’ approaches.
 

Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to HIPAA Weekly Advisor!

• E-mail to a Colleague
• Print
• RSS
• Archive