Health Information Management

Florida hospitals factor HIPAA into patient rooming

HIPAA Weekly Advisor, September 13, 2004

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Soon, any patients treated at 618-bed Tallahassee Memorial Hospital or the 180-bed Capital Regional Medical Center (CRMC) will have their own rooms. This comes from an effort to increase privacy and maximize comfort, Tallahassee.com reports.

Offering private rooms to patients is part of a national trend prompted by HIPAA concerns, Rick Wade, senior vice president of communications at the American Hospital Association told the news source. "This has been happening slowly for the past eight or 10 years."

To comply with HIPAA, healthcare providers had to restrict when and where they provided information and asked questions when treating patients housed in rooms with others. Private rooms offer them more flexibility.

HIPAA currently does not dictate hospital architecture, but the day could come. Some hospitals have already taken the initiative-according to Tallahassee.com, CRMC designed its new facility with patient privacy in mind, even adding private areas to admitting rooms.



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