Regulation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
Name:
Institution:
Regulation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
The Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) offers protections and
privileges for beneficiaries and participants within group health covers and
plans. The main aim of the act involved assisting consumers in the maintenance
of their respective insurance plans as well as augmenting the effectiveness and
efficiency of the United
States health care framework as per the
provision of Administrative Simplification. Nonetheless, an imperative facet of
the HIPAA Act involves the presence of the Standards for Privacy of
Individually Identifiable Health Information. Commonly identified as the
Privacy Rule, the aforementioned provision constitutes a framework of
nationwide standards that assist in the protection of definite health
information (McTeigue, Lee, & Aiken, 2015). Due to the significant role
that the Privacy Rule assumes in respect to HIPAA regulations, the government
agency that regulates it comprises the Office for Civil Rights (OCR), which
maintains a considerable responsibility in the implementation and enforcement
of the Privacy Rule in relation to intentional compliance activities as well as
civil monetary damages. Apart from the Office for Civil Rights, the Department
of Health and Human Services assumes a significant role in the regulation of
the HIPAA Act in its entirety (McTeigue, Lee, & Aiken, 2015). In fact, the
Department of Health and Human Services as a government agency is responsible
for carrying out the mandate of the respective statute. This is primarily due
to the responsibilities that the agency in question assumes especially in
protecting the health of civilians across the United States. The entities
mentioned above work together in an effort to ensure that the HIPAA Act is
articulated effectively. In its own manner, the Department of Health and Human
Services applies the HIPAA Act as a measure effective in implementing and
improving health care reforms within the country’s healthcare. The Office for
Civil Rights, which works under the aforementioned government agency, assumes
the obligations associated with the protection and security of information that
customers provide in relation to their insurance coverages.
References
McTeigue, J., Lee, W. C., & Aiken, T. D. (2015). Legal and ethical issues for health professions. St. Louis, MO: Elsevier.