The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) set forth industry standards for organizations working in healthcare, however, HIPAA is not static, it is constantly evolving to adapt to the changing healthcare environment.
As such healthcare entities must update their HIPAA compliance program to incorporate changes in the law. The HIPAA compliance checklist 2020 allows HIPAA-beholden entities to measure themselves against the HIPAA regulation to ensure that they have all that is required by law.
What is the HIPAA Compliance Checklist 2020?
HIPAA compliance in 2020 has never been more important as healthcare breaches and HIPAA audits continue to rise. Utilizing a HIPAA compliance checklist 2020 enables an organization to assess their current business practices to ensure that they are in line with HIPAA 2020 standards.
The following is a HIPAA compliance checklist 2020 that you may use to assess your business processes:
Have you Conducted the following six required annual self-audits (five for business associates (BA’s))?
– Security Risk Assessment (SRA)
– Security Standards Audit
– Privacy Assessment (not required for BA’s)
– HITECH Suptitle D Audit
– Asset and Device Audit
– Physical Sit Audit
Have you utilized the self-audits to identify gaps?
– Have you documented the gaps identified by self-audits?
Have you created the remediation plans that address the identified gaps?
– Are remediation plans documented in writing?
– Are your remediation plans reviewed and updated annually?
– Are your remediation plans retained in your records for six years?
Have all employees completed their annual HIPAA training?
– Is there documentation proving that all of your employees received training?
– Do you have a designated HIPAA Compliance, Privacy, and/or Security Officer?
Do you have Policies and Procedures that directly apply to your business practices and incorporate HIPAA Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Rules?
– Have all employees legally attested to to your organization’s Policies and Procedures?
– Do you have the documentation that proves their legal attestation?
– Do you have documentation for annual reviews of your Policies and Procedures?
Have you identified all of your Business Associates and vendors?
– Do you have signed Business Associate Agreements with all of your Business Associates?
– Have you done your technical due diligence by assessing your Business Associates’ HIPAA compliance?
– Are you reviewing and tracking your Business Associate Agreements annually?
– Do you have Confidentiality Agreements in place with your vendors that are not Business Associates?
Do you have an incident response plan and clearly defined process for breaches?
– Do you have the ability to track and manage the investigations of all incidents?
– Are you able to provide the required reporting of minor or meaningful breaches or incidents?
– Do your staff members have the ability to anonymously report an incident?
Do you Need Help with your HIPAA Compliance Checklist 2020?
Navigating HIPAA compliance can be a difficult endeavor as the law is ambiguous. When completing your HIPAA compliance checklist 2020, it is best to consult an expert to ensure that you have addressed the full extent of the HIPAA regulation.
Source – Compliancy Group
