Medical Transcription Service HIPAA Policy

HIPAA Requirements and Procedures

Privacy and security of medical records is extremely important to us and it is mandated by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).

The HIPAA Privacy Rule requires covered entities (health plans, healthcare clearinghouses and healthcare providers) to make reasonable efforts to limit the use or disclosure of, and requests for protected health information (PHI) to the minimum
necessary to accomplish the intended purposes. The uses of PHI are limited to those related to treatment, payment and healthcare operations (TPO). Covered entities are further required to contractually bind other entities (“Business Associates”) with whom they share Protected Health Information to ensure that those entities also comply with restrictions related to PHI.

Our Commitment
Carol Roberts Transcription is committed to ensuring that all necessary policies, procedures and safeguards are in place at all times to comply with HIPAA Privacy Rule requirements in the handling of protected health information in all areas of the company and with any and all business associates that are permitted access to PHI.

Policies & Procedures
HIPAA Training: All employees of the company are trained to ensure they understand the security requirements and are equipped to comply with all policies and procedures.
The proprietary transcription desktop application applies 128-bit encryption to all files prior to any file transmission via the public Internet to our data center servers. Secure Mail web applications is forced to occur using the HTTPS protocol (SSL – secure socket layer) with 128-bit encryption strength. Attempts to access the application without SSL are redirected.

During the processing of voice files to completed transcribed documents, only medical transcriptionists (MT) and quality control (QC) personnel are permitted access to files. All printed materials are shredded after their useful life, typically less than 24 hours.
Completed transcribed documents are returned to our servers from transcription work sites using the 128-bit SSL encrypted protocol.
Customers retrieve completed files by signing in with a user name and password, giving them access only to their files.

All servers and databases are located on a secured internal network that is protected by state-of-the-art Hardware Firewalls.
Access to our database is limited to registered users. Users must provide their username and password to gain entry.