HIPAA Privacy, Security Updates Coming
HITECH mandates the modifications
The modifications are necessary to implement certain unspecified provisions of the HITECH Act, a section of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, according to the Department of Health and Human Services and its Office for Civil Rights.
The notice published in the Federal Register April 26 offers no specific details on the nature of the new rules.
Spokesmen for HHS and the Office for Civil Rights declined to comment on the Federal Register notice. Instead, they pointed to a statement on the OCR web site referring to rules still in the works, which had been due in February, governing "business associate liability; new limitations on the sale of protected health information, marketing and fundraising communications; and stronger individual rights to access electronic medical records and restrict the disclosure of certain information."
