4.3 Million Penalty Assessed Under HITECH for HIPAA violations One might say that it looks like HHS and OCR are making up for all those years people have said there has been a lack of enforcement of HIPAA — 4.3 million dollars worth of “making up for lost time” in just one shot…. HHS...
ONC Open Casting Calls Prepared by Krystyna Nowik, Esq. Last week, ONC opened a thirty-day window for organizations to apply to become the sole accrediting entity to oversee certifying organizations under the Permanent Certification Program for Health Information Technology...
Accounting of Disclosures Proposed Rule up for Review: The Beginning of a Collective Sigh of Relief or Covered Entities’ Newest Nightmare? Prepared by Krystyna H. Nowik, Esq. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has finally received the long-awaited proposed rule addressing...
U.S. Supreme Court to Consider Whether Prescription Data Mining is Protected under First Amendment In November 2010, legalhie.com mentioned that the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit had issued its ruling that Vermont’s drug-marketing restrictions were unconstitutional. Vermont’s...
ONC Announces Launch of “Direct Project” Pilots In a Press Release posted today, February 2nd, ONC announced that providers and public health agencies in Minnesota and Rhode Island began this month exchanging health information using specifications developed by the Direct Project, which...
HITECH Takes a Political HIT A Bill introduced in the House (H.R.408) Spending Reduction Act of 2011, aims to reduce spending by trillions of dollars, including by eliminating funding for Meaningful Use. Although it is too early to tell if the Bill would get very far, it could make...
Doctors and Patients Mostly Agree on IT Government Health IT reported yesterday that according to a national survey released January 31st by the Markle Foundation, patient and physicians share many similar views regarding increasing beneficial use of health information technology to...
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Declared Unconstitutional In a brief 78 page Opinion, Federal District Court Judge Roger Vinson of the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of Florida struck down portions of the the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on...
Are Cloud-based HIEs Subject to Twitter-Google-Facebook-like Subpoenas? In a recent New York Times article, Google, Twitter and other internet companies raise concerns regarding the wave of requests they receive for customer data from law enforcement agencies. Last year, Google counted...
HHS Announces New Funding to Help States Implement Affordable Care Act Posted today on HHS’ Website: Today, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced a new funding opportunity for grants to help states continue their work to implement a key provision of the...
ACO Pilots for New Jersey — Will they “fly”? The New Jersey Health Care Quality Institute (NJHCQI) brought together several distinguished experts to discuss the development of and implications for the new accountable care organization (ACO) models and rules being established on a...
Think you are Exempt from the Red Flags Rule? … Don’t Take Your Red Flags Down So Fast. Prepared by Krystyna Nowik, Esq. Health care providers and the Identity Theft Red Flags and Address Discrepancies Final Rule (“Red Flags Rule”) have had a drawn-out and bumpy history together....
(meta-data) “TAG, You-Are-It” (ONC, CMS, DHHS) ! This December 2010, the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (“PCAST”) released its Report titled “Realizing the Full Potential of Health Information Technology to Improve Healthcare for Americans: The Path Forward,”...
ACOs – Progressive HIEs, or Clinical Integration Déjà vu? During my (long) flight back from the Southwest yesterday, an article in the Wall Street Journal caught my eye. It was entitled “Embracing Incentives for Efficient Health Care” and prompted me to think about similarities...
Drug Database Firms Have Much to be Thankful for this Past Thanksgiving as Second Circuit says “Good-Bye” to Vermont’s Drug Marketing Restrictions On November 23, 2010, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit issued its ruling that Vermont’s drug-marketing restrictions were...