Health Law Alert

On September 17, 2014, the Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) published new guidance (the “Guidance”) regarding certain HIPAA provisions in light of the Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Windsor, in which the Court found section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act—which defined marriage and spouse to exclude […]

Although the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently relaxed Medicare hospital staffing requirements to allow qualified dietitians and nutritionists to order patient diets, state law still prevents these practitioners from practicing independently in Nebraska and Iowa hospitals. Medicare Conditions of Participation (CoPs) previously permitted only the physician or […]

Note: The following questions are the second part in a series about patient portals. For last month’s article on patient portals click here. Q: How should information about patient portals and the functionalities/capabilities be communicated to patients? A: Each patient portal is unique in terms of how patients register and […]

On Friday, August 29, 2014, CMS published a Final Rule providing additional flexibility to providers who have had difficulties implementing 2014 Edition certified electronic health record technology (“CEHRT”). This rule adopts the proposed rule published May 23, 2014. Under the Final Rule, Eligible Professionals, Eligible Hospitals and CAHs that could […]

While details have not been made public, it is possible that a properly configured robots.txt file could have prevented the patient data exposure which was the genesis of the recent $4.8 million HIPAA settlement made by New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center (see: http://cynergistek.com/columbia-presbyterian-settle-hipaa-violations-for-4-8-million/). From the information which was made […]