It is well known that every business should focus on its core competencies and the more pressing matters instead of stressing over the little things. This is where the concept of outsourcing comes in as a savior. If you are operating a medical service, it is highly important to focus more on the patients rather than the small matters like billing, etc.
It is critical for medical offices to understand the significance of medical billing companies. From a financial standpoint, they are the cornerstone of practices and medical offices. These businesses aid in increasing profits and productivity. Furthermore, they successfully process claims and reduce collection time. The best part is that they always do their job under HIPAA regulations as well as government standard procedures.
First, let’s start with the basics.
What is HIPAA?
HIPAA stands for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. This law is laid down to safeguard and protect medical information. As a result of data breaches, this law was encouraged as a means of data security.
The two main purposes or components of the HIPAA Act are continuous health insurance for workers who change or lose their job and lowering healthcare costs by standardizing the electronic data interchange of financial and administrative transactions.
Some other objectives are fighting abuse, deception, and obliteration in health insurance and healthcare delivery and enhancing access to long-term care benefits and health insurance.
It also comprises how healthcare providers and associated enterprises are supposed to handle and protect your data, such as health records, while at the same time keeping in alignment with the standards to meet the PHI data.
Many medical service companies prefer outsourcing their medical billing services to increase efficiency and for better customer satisfaction. Let’s understand how these billing services assist in business efficiencies.
What Entities Come Under HIPAA Guidelines?
The HIPAA rule covers the following entities:
- Healthcare Providers: Irrespective of the size or the type, every healthcare provider comes under the HIPAA rule.
- Business Associates: An individual or an organization that involves using, communicating, or transacting medical information in any form. The transactions may include – Data analysis, billing, etc.
- Healthcare Clearinghouses: Entities that convert non-standard information received from another organization into standard information (i.e., basic format or information) or vice versa.
Business Benefits of HIPAA
Staying under HIPAA law is mandatory for every healthcare provider. Let’s take a look at the benefits that are associated with HIPAA compliance. The HIPAA-compliant medical coding services are of great assistance to medical providers.
Secured Processes
HIPAA compliance requires medical billing service providers to deal with e-PHI (Electronic Protected Health Information) to ensure its confidentiality, integrity, and security. It also requires the entity to conduct a rigorous risk assessment, such as identifying and evaluating potential threats and risks to e-PHI, proactively implementing security measures to mitigate risks, and maintaining and tracking security protocols to enhance workplace security.
Security Assurance and Trust
Being HIPAA Compliant allows businesses or medical practitioners to gain the trust of the customers and expand to a larger consumer base. This is because the patients, or the prospective clients, are confident and sure that their data is being protected at all times.
More Transparency and Profitability
A business being in compliance with HIPAA results in a sense of transparency and increased profitability. By utilizing HIPAA norms, you can reach new customers in an ever-changing market.
Differentiation
In today’s constantly evolving world, it is of paramount importance to develop a sense of uniqueness and authenticity. Using HIPAA compliance, a business or medical provider can assure that they are trusted and preferred by the customers.
To comply with HIPAA law, it is imperative that you understand every aspect. If you are looking to outsource, then find a medical billing task provider that is in compliance with HIPAA and knows the rules, the technology, and the government policies.
HIPAA came into existence to protect not only medical practitioners but also business owners to help them protect and safeguard their data.
Conclusion
In case of security breaches and hacking, the law of HIPAA is a gift to medical service providers and patients. When in compliance with the law, it creates an environment and culture focused on safeguarding the patient’s important data. If you outsource, Third-party security evaluators trained in HIPAA compliance can also perform routine audits and potential malicious tests on your devices, ensuring that any security breaches are discovered and rectified before a breach or HIPAA problem occurs.
