Federal panel cites compliance confusion: Government falls short on HIPAA help

Physicians are still not sure what they must do to meet requirements of the medical records privacy law.

By Joel B. Finkelstein, AMNews staff. Dec. 16, 2002.

Washington -- The deadline for complying with rules protecting patients' privacy is looming, and the government isn't doing enough to get the message out, according to a federal advisory panel.

Recent letters from the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics laid out Dept. of Health and Human Services shortcomings that are undermining the push to physician compliance with the privacy rules.

"There is an extremely high level of confusion, misunderstanding, frustration, anxiety, fear and anger as the April 14, 2003, compliance date nears," the committee wrote in a November letter to HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson.

The privacy rules are part of the administrative simplification provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. They require all doctors' offices, including small practices, that use electronic billing to follow standardized rules to protect their patients' personal and medical information.

"Physicians in large practices and academic centers are well on their way" toward compliance, said Mark Rothstein, chair of the NCVHS subcommittee on privacy and confidentiality, which has held nationwide public meetings to assess readiness among solo physicians, large medical practices and everything in between.

"The problem is, small practices -- especially rural doctors -- don't have the resources, expertise or time to comply," he said.

Even some larger practices are unlikely to be ready by the April deadline, said Ryan O'Connor of the American Medical Group Assn. "I don't want to say they are in denial, but they are almost acting that way." [...]