This week in health IT: Record fine, ONC activity
It's been a busy week on several fronts with the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) doling out the highest fine for HIPAA violations to date and the Health IT Policy Committee (HITPC) holding its monthly meeting as well as a hearing on certification.
New York-Presbyterian Hospital (NYP) and Columbia University Medical Center (CU) together have agreed to pay a record-breaking $4.8 million to settle alleged HIPAA violations after the electronic protected health information (ePHI) of 6,800 patients wound up on Google in 2010.
In addition to the ePHI disclosure, the OCR’s investigation found that neither NYP nor CU made efforts prior to the breach to assure that its hardware was secure and contained appropriate software protections. Plus, neither entity had conducted an accurate and thorough risk analysis that identified all systems that access NYP ePHI so neither entity had developed an adequate risk management plan.
Meanwhile, the HITPC endorsed voluntary certification criteria governing transitions of care and privacy and security for long-term and post-acute care and behavioral health providers, discussed the thinking behind its proposed rule for 2015 Edition Certified EHR Technology and reviewed the draft FDASIA report on patient safety and health IT.
The HITPC also held a hearing on certification that offered all the stakeholders--providers, vendors, accreditation bodies and the private sector—a chance to share their thoughts. Stakeholders resoundly told the Adoption & Certification Workgroup that the scope, compressed timeframe and resource needs of EHR certification hindered their ability to delivery care and innovate. The workgroup formally endorsed narrowing certification requirements to interoperability, clinical quality measures and privacy and security, and embarking on an end-to-end, holistic, rapid improvement process to improve certification.
It remains to be seen whether the ONC will hold true to its pledge to reduce regulatory burden but it is certainly taking the right steps.
Beth Walsh
Clinical Innovation + Technology editor
Editor
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.