Professional Issues

HIPAA

What is The Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA)?
Congress enacted the HIPAA to ensure the portability of health insurance and eliminate preexisting condition clauses. HIPPA also established Administrative Simplification provisions to improve health care quality and reduce costs by simplifying the administration and management of health information through the integration of electronic transactions in the health care industry. However, Congress also recognized that regulations were necessary to protect against the inappropriate and unauthorized use, access, and disclosure of confidential health information.

Federal regulations were established in 1996 to protect the medical privacy of clients. The compliance deadline for Medical Privacy regulations was April 14, 2003.

How can social workers determine whether they must comply? When do the federal standards become effective? These are a few of the questions answered on NASW's national Web site. See http://www.socialworkers.org/hipaa/default.asp for more detailed information, including additional deadlines, resources, and compliance/training information.