Dear RIS Insider,
HIPAA compliance is turning out to be a more difficult task than originally envisioned, according to the folks who make up the U.S. healthcare market. The latest iteration of the U.S. Healthcare Industry HIPAA Compliance Survey, conducted in June by Phoenix Health Systems and the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS), shows that the healthcare industry is not even close to standardizing healthcare business transactions.
Although it's been nine months since compliance with HIPAA’s transactions and code sets (TCS) were supposed to be enacted by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), only 65% of providers, 62% of payors, and 64% of clearinghouses indicate that they are currently fully compliant, according to the survey. Even more troubling, the survey found that less than half of providers and payors are conducting all of the standard transactions required for their business functions.
The CMS, which has adopted a contingency plan that allows acceptance of noncompliant HIPAA transactions, may be running out of patience. As of July 1, the CMS modified its guidelines so that noncompliant transactions submitted to Medicare require another 13 days for payment. And the agency has said that time is running out on its contingency plan.
It’s not just HIPAA TCS that’s bedeviling IS administrators and IT directors; privacy and security rules are also tracking across their radar. The good news is that compliance with the HIPAA Privacy Rule is improving, at least among payors. However, providers are showing about a 22% noncompliance rate, which is an increase from another survey conducted this January.
Security Rule compliance does not go into effect until next April, and progress toward compliance remains slow, with 18% of providers having a plan in place. To see where your group measures up in its efforts to be HIPAA compliant, check out the RIS Insider Exclusive. As a RIS Insider subscriber, you have access to this story before it’s published for the rest of our AuntMinnie.com members next week.
Lastly, if you have a comment or story to share about HIPAA, RIS, or IT in general, please get in touch with me at [email protected]. I look forward to hearing from you.
