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Rule over HIPAA privacy and security compliance: Follow the wise advice of the 'HIPAA Queen'

HIPAA Training Advisor, June 26, 2008

When her organization assigned her the title of chief privacy officer at Community Health and Counseling Services (CHCS) in 2003, Rhonda Edgecomb, RHIT, CHP, welcomed several additional responsibilities. Among them was the daunting task of training more than 1,000 employees at more than 40 offices spread out from the base office in Bangor, ME. Overnight, she morphed into what she calls the “HIPAA Queen”—ruler of all things related to privacy and security.
 
Five years later, Edgecomb believes her laid-back, humorous training presentation, “HIPAA Privacy Simplified,” has helped her organization manage the demands of HIPAA and other laws governing the maintenance and control of healthcare information.
 
Protecting privacy and security is a serious matter, but Edgecomb knew right away that serious isn’t always attention-grabbing. So in 2003, the HIPAA Queen took off on a road trip to many of the CHCS sites from Central Maine up to the Canadian border. “I affectionately referred to it as ‘the HIPAA road show,’ ” Edgecomb says.
 
It was through the road show that she conducted initial training of all staff members. But her goal wasn’t simply to recite the rules; it was to explain the rules in an articulate, down-to-earth manner so the finer points of HIPAA law would resonate with staff members.
 
Before each training session, Edgecomb lays out the “royal” rules for the attendees, including general etiquette requests (e.g., pagers and cells phones must be off and sidebar conversations aren’t allowed).
 
Next come the rules that she has created for herself as she gives her presentations:
  • Make them laugh. Jokes keep staff members awake and alert, Edgecomb says. “The material can be so boring that you need to use humor,” she adds.

  • Make it interactive. Edgecomb says she understands that, in this field, everyone has a tale to tell. “Always leave time for people to give examples of inappropriate disclosures of patient care,” she says. “Everyone has his or her own relevant story to tell, so I try to keep it interactive. It’s important for people to participate.”

  • Use lots of examples. Don’t be afraid to use pop culture or some other strategy to engage the audience and make your point at the same time. “I try to use examples of episodes of sitcoms I know people have seen,” says Edgecomb. “Like the Seinfeld episode when Elaine has the rash and sought the assistance of her family physician for relief.” 

    In that episode, Elaine grows increasingly concerned about a medical record entry made by her physician that labels her a difficult patient. For the remainder of the episode, Elaine becomes obsessed with the need to delete the entry and even goes to the extreme of recruiting Kramer to pose as a physician to steal the entire medical record. Edgecomb explains that under the HIPAA privacy rule, Elaine would not only hold the right to request access to the medical record, but she would also have the opportunity to request an amendment to the entry that she found so disturbing.

  • Be entertaining. Like a live entertainer, Edgecomb has good and bad performances. “Sometimes, I can really tell that I am engaging them. But some are tougher audiences than others,” she says. “I truly feel that I am a stand-up comedian. You have to modify your examples sometimes to get their attention. You have to be adaptable.”
Following their initial training, staff members raved. Many didn’t expect to laugh as much or be as engaged when they sat down for a mandatory two-hour HIPAA training session, Edgecomb says. “It’s my firm belief that when you are laughing and having a good time, you are going to learn better,” she says. “So if you are entertaining the people, they are going to retain things better.”
 
But it’s not entirely about exchanging information and educating staff members, because scenarios with gray areas will inevitably occur. That’s when you need to trust that you have provided your staff with the tools to make the right decisions.

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