5 Ways a HIPAA Privacy Officer Can Support Your Facility

Maintaining patient privacy and confidentiality is not only necessary for the delivery of quality care, but it’s also a regulatory requirement. While the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) outlines a detailed set of rules, all of this information can be difficult to follow accurately without proper guidance. This is where the role of a HIPAA privacy officer comes in.

What exactly is a privacy compliance officer and what does the role entail? In this article, we’ll discuss what these professionals do and highlight five ways a HIPAA enforcer can benefit your facility.

What Does a HIPAA Privacy Officer Do in the Healthcare Field?

Within the context of healthcare, a privacy officer, also known as a chief privacy officer (CPO), is responsible for creating, managing, and improving policies and procedures that facilities must implement to meet HIPAA standards. They’re typically experts on all relevant HIPAA regulations, along with the ins and outs of a facility’s information systems.

Under the HIPAA privacy rule, facilities are required to designate an officer who helps uphold rules regarding the appropriate access, exchange, and storage of protected health information (PHI). Depending on the size of a facility, this role may be established as a new position or assigned to existing administrative/IT staff.

HIPAA Privacy Officer vs. Security Officer: What Are the Key Differences?

While these roles may sound similar, their duties are unique. A CPO is responsible for ensuring compliance with HIPAA rules and regulations. Therefore, HIPAA privacy officer training involves extensive familiarity with the legal intricacies of HIPAA. These employees are also responsible for ensuring that staff members within their organization understand these rules and abide by them at the clinical and executive levels.

In contrast, security officers work primarily to protect patient health information and ensure that the privacy rights of individuals receiving care are upheld. While they must also have a thorough understanding of HIPAA, their role doesn’t require the in-depth policy understanding that the role of a HIPAA enforcer might demand.

How Can a Privacy Officer Support Your Facility?

As a facility leader responsible for designating a CPO, you may be wondering how exactly this role works to support your staff. Here are five specific ways that a CPO can benefit the workflow and quality of your facility’s HIPAA policies and procedures.

1. Create and Evaluate HIPAA Policies

One of the primary responsibilities listed in a HIPAA privacy officer job description is to oversee all procedures that dictate PHI handling at a facility. Not only do these employees help create policies that meet regulatory requirements, but they also continually monitor the effectiveness of any HIPAA practices that are put in place. Through conducting regular risk assessments, the CPO can help determine whether facility-level procedures actually meet all federal and state rules.

The CPO also maintains records on past and current HIPAA procedures. This enables facilities to present any required documentation if they’re under review for a violation, or for other regulatory reasons such as a Joint Commission visit.

2. Improve Existing HIPAA Measures

Risk assessments also allow the CPO to promptly identify any shortcomings in facility-level policies and make appropriate changes for improvement. This ensures that any security risks are addressed to minimize the occurrence of preventable HIPAA violations.

At the federal level, HIPAA regulations are regularly amended to keep up with new data challenges arising from technological advances in the healthcare industry. The CPO will be responsible for keeping up with these changes to ensure that facilities are retiring outdated practices and adopting the latest evidence-based procedures.

3. Ensure Facility-Wide HIPAA Compliance

For a privacy officer, HIPAA familiarity is essential to helping their organization provide high-quality care. Beyond optimizing existing policies and procedures, the CPO will also be responsible for ensuring that staff are working to uphold them. They regularly monitor activity of staff members who are accessing or using PHI to carry out their job duties. If any behavior strays away from HIPAA protocol, the CPO takes measures to enforce appropriate action.

Additionally, a CPO leads initiatives in creating, conducting, or updating HIPAA compliance training for all staff members who handle PHI. HIPAA has specific criteria on who should receive training and what training sessions should include. The CPO will be responsible for keeping up with these guidelines to ensure that your facility is delivering all essential information to your staff.

4. Consult With Staff and Patients

As a HIPAA expert, the CPO will have a breadth and depth of knowledge on all regulations surrounding patient confidentiality and privacy. This allows them to be a reliable point person if staff have concerns or questions about maintaining HIPAA compliance. For instance, if staff are unsure whether they should access a patient’s PHI, they can simply consult the CPO instead of sifting through HIPAA regulations, which can help increase the efficiency of the care team.

Patients and families may also have questions or concerns about accessing their own PHI. As the healthcare team juggles many other responsibilities throughout the day, it can help to refer these individuals to the designated CPO, who can provide detailed expertise on patient-related access policies.

5. Oversee Incident Reporting and Management

Even for facilities that employ a privacy officer, HIPAA violations can occur either intentionally or unintentionally. Regardless of the cause, it’s important to have a clear system for reporting these cases so that any violations are resolved appropriately. The CPO not only helps create an effective system for incident reporting, but also analyzes reports to implement improvements so that similar incidents can be prevented.

Is Your Facility HIPAA Compliant?

Now that you’ve learned how a HIPAA privacy officer can support your staff and patients, you may be seeking more ways to improve your HIPAA policies. Stay informed with IntelyCare’s free newsletter and don’t miss out on other regulatory guides designed to help you maintain compliance.