subject: What Does Hippa Stand For? [print this page] If you're a medical company of any kind then you've most certainly heard of HIPPA. If you're doing business in New Jersey, for instance, you probably have spent time locating a New Jersey Shredding service that is fully HIPAA compliant so that you can make sure that you're adhering to the law as carefully as possible. HIPAA is in essence a set of laws which is designed to protect the private information of patients that do business with medical facilities.
HIPAA stands for the health insurance portability and accountability act. This means that it is a set of laws which are designed to make sure that patient information is protected. Patients often have to provide information to health care facilities in order to receive treatment. Under the law however, that information belongs to the patient, not the health care facility. As such, it is the responsibility of the health care facility to protect that information while it is in their possession.
As in all cases of privacy protection, document destruction is found to be the most effective way of preserving private information which has been marked down in print. This is what HIPAA states. It states that any medical facility must have a written policy which details how they will undertake and maintain the regular shredding of any documentation which contains private patient information.
This law covers any facility which is even remotely connected to the health care industry. Obviously, this means that hospitals and doctor's offices are covered. However, other covered professionals include dentists, eye doctors, and even massage therapists, physiotherapists, and chiropractors. It is a fairly wide spanning law, and it covers almost everyone that is even remotely connected to this industry. Generally speaking, if a place of business has customers which are referred to as "patients" it will need to comply with HIPAA.
The kinds of information which are protected under this law are just as wide spanning. They include things like billing, banking and insurance information. They also include medical information, such as test results.
Couriers also must be HIPAA compliant if they are working in the medical industry. That is why most medical couriers will advertise that they are HIPAA compliant. Otherwise, hospitals and other health care facilities would not hire them to move goods for them, because the accompanying courier documentation might contain patient information which is covered under the act, such as when test samples are being shipped to a lab.
