The purpose of your business may only be to earn a high profit. It can only happen if you’re performing better than your competitors in the industry. But the question is, do you only have to be concerned with these things?
If you ensure your ROI is high and you’re beating your competitors, your business can’t stop? Well, not exactly. There are certain laws and regulations you need to abide by. One of them is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (also known as HIPAA).
This act was passed in 1996 as a federal law to protect the sensitive and personal information of health patients. This information is also called PHI (protected health information). Now, the question is, “How does HIPAA ensure businesses follow these standards?”
The answer which you’re looking for is a business associate agreement. If you’re not quite following us, don’t worry.
That’s exactly why we’re here. To make you understand
By the end of this blog, you’ll have a clear idea about the nitty-gritty of a business associate agreement.
Before we move on to the business associate agreement, let’s first discuss the people for whom this agreement is for – the business associates. These are the 3rd party individuals or entities who provide services that involve accessing protected health information.
Some of the common information found in PHI are names, contact details, account numbers, and other documents details. Would you want to have this information disclosed publicly? Surely you wouldn’t.
That’s why HIPAA only works with business associates who comply with their rules. So, if you have this clause available, why not use it?
Whenever you are availing service from a 3rd party provider, ensure that the person/entity is a HIPAA business associate (HIPAA BA). For qualifying and being a HIPAA BA, one should sign a contract to make it official.
This allows us to perfectly bring up the next point of our discussion.
Now that you’ve understood the business and what they do, let’s touch down on the business associate agreement. A BAA agreement is a contract that defines the use of protected health information (PHI) that’s provided to the business associates.
Some of the essential details and information that you should have on your HIPAA BAA are:
To make sure you have an effective and foolproof business associate agreement, it needs to comply with the HIPAA guidelines. If you want to save a lot of effort and mitigate the legal risk, you can hire reliable legal experts who have the experience you can take advantage of.
We’ve given you all the basic knowledge about business associates, business associate agreements, and following the HIPAA guidelines. But with all that information, you’d want to know, “where would this be applied?”
So, let’s discuss the people who need to sign a HIPAA business associate agreement. Answering that will also respond to a potential query of yours, “who are the potential business associates?”
Literally, everyone who can come in contact with your PHI needs to sign a HIPAA BAA. Even though your own company employees are exempt from this, they will need to abide by the HIPAA clause. If they disclose the PHI, there would be repercussions.
Some of the most common business associates that can be seen in the industries are:
During audits and other activities, your accountant may ask to see your patient information. They do this to track payment bills, mode of payment, among many things.
Your internet service provider can view your patient information by viewing your browsing history. As unlikely it may be, it’s always better to be safe than sorry.
It’s like you’re giving something to someone for safekeeping and expecting them to be honest. Before you upload your data on cloud software, ensure it is HIPAA compliant.
Do you think the business associate agreement is only to safeguard your interests? If you are, that’s a mistake. HIPAA has no favorites. The reason why it has standards and rules in place is that it wants to protect the interests of both parties. During your interaction with your business associate, you can be sued if you’re the one to violate the HIPAA BAA.
You now have enough information about the business associates and who they are. Most of you would be thinking about yourself and your health business wellbeing. You’d want to know, “Do my practices require me to have a HIPAA BAA?”
Let us ask you a similar question as we did earlier in the blog.
“Would You Want Your Patient Details to Be Accessed by an Unauthorized Person”?
This doesn’t only have the potential to cause harm to your medical career but it can also cause a rift between you and your patients. Would you want to risk that? Definitely, you won’t.
So, it doesn’t matter which medical service you’re offering. If you’re hiring a 3rd party entity and there’s even a slight chance they might access the PHI, you know what to do. If you are unsure about whether you want to go for a BAA agreement or where to start, we’ve got you covered.
At Wortham LLP, we have qualified and proven legal specialists at your service. We provide the insight and information you need to preserve your patient’s sensitive data.
A HIPAA business associate agreement gives you that extra cushion to save your health business and enjoy sustainable growth.
It’s better to be proactive instead of reactive and waiting for things to go wrong. The contract will ensure both parties are on the same page. Both parties will be aware of what will happen if someone breaches the contract and what penalty they’ll have to face.
START YOUR EFFORTS TO PROTECT YOUR BUSINESS VALUES TODAY