On Dec. 10, with just a few weeks remaining in its tenure, the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) proposed a series of changes to the HIPAA Privacy Rule. Public comments on the proposed rule were … [Read more...]
HIPAA
Proposed HIPAA Privacy Rule: The 9 Changes That Will Have an Immediate Impact on Lab Operations
March 17, 2021
Compliance
By The Numbers: The Costs of Not Complying With HIPAA Requirements
February 22, 2021
Although it doesn’t make the federal government nearly as much money as the False Claims Act and other healthcare fraud law, enforcing HIPAA is still quite a profitable business. There’s also less … [Read more...]
Utilization Management
New Federal Regulations Streamline and Speed Up Payor Prior Authorization
January 30, 2021
In its final days, the Trump administration finalized (and, in the eyes of many in the health care industry, rushed) regulatory changes designed to ease prior authorization rules and improve provider … [Read more...]
Utilization Management
CMS Proposes New Regulations to Streamline and Speed Up Payor Prior Authorization
January 4, 2021
As its days dwindle down, the Trump administration proposed regulatory changes designed to ease prior authorization rules and improve provider and patient access to medical records. Specifically, the … [Read more...]
HIPAA
HHS Proposes Significant Value-Based Care Changes to HIPAA Privacy Rule
December 21, 2020
As its days dwindle down, the current administration is mobilizing for one final push to reduce what it perceives to be unnecessarily burdensome regulation, including on the medical privacy front. On … [Read more...]
Focus On
OCR Audit Gives Providers Mixed Results for HIPAA Compliance
December 20, 2020
The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act) requires the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) to periodically audit covered entities and business associates for … [Read more...]
CYBERSECURITY
Compliance Perspectives: Complying with HIPAA Isn’t Enough to Manage Data Breach Liability Risks
August 5, 2019
Memo to lab managers and compliance officers: It may be time to rethink your data breach response strategy. This directive is the result not of any substantive changes to the HIPAA rules but rather to … [Read more...]
COMPLIANCE CORNER
Cybersecurity: The 10 Things HHS Says You Should Be Doing to Stop Phishing, Ransomware and Other Threats
February 18, 2019
HHS published guidance on cybersecurity for healthcare organizations. Even though it's voluntary, the new HHS Guidance is significant to the extent it lays out the agency's expectations of the … [Read more...]
INFORMATICS
Big Data Can Reshape Lab Reference Values in the Era of Personalized Medicine
December 31, 2018
As might be expected, there are substantial differences in "normal" laboratory values determined by healthy outpatients and critically ill patients in the intensive care unit (ICU). However, even … [Read more...]
INDUSTRY TRENDS
One-Fourth of Myriad’s Variants of Unknown Significance Reclassified Over 10 Years
November 19, 2018
Variant reclassification following hereditary cancer genetic testing is common, according to a study published by Myriad Genetics (Salt Lake City) Sept. 25 in the Journal of the American Medical … [Read more...]
