Impact of HIPAA on the Healthcare - Essay Example

 "Impact of HIPAA on the Healthcare" is a significant example of a paper on the health system.
Apparently, healthcare is one of the largest and fastest-growing industries in the US, which further leads to the formation of a huge part of the country’s economy. For the past decade, healthcare has been documented to form the highest percentage of the country’s total economic power. Basically, healthcare in the  US  is of two types;  private healthcare that comprises direct out of pocket payment and the public care that is mostly funded by the government.

            Nevertheless, healthcare has been faced by numerous challenges that have compelled the industry to seek for assistance from the HIPPA. Of importance to note is that the traditional healthcare delivery system required a digital migration in order to improve their services. Conversely, HIPPA had already been confirmed to be of assistance although it was a complicated process.

             Consequently, healthcare had to use the HIPPA which was both pre-HIPPA and post-HIPPA in an attempt to seek solutions for the escalating issues in healthcare. As such, the HIPPA had set out goals which include; limiting the use of health information, increasing patients’ access to their records, establishing legal accountability and penalties among other goals that the healthcare had difficulties in accomplishing (HIPAA's Effects on US healthcare, 2009).

Literature Review

            According to HIPAA's Effects on US healthcare (2009), the literature review revolved around the history of U.S    healthcare and its delivery systems,  the history of HIPPA, the effects of a business partnership, and the effect of increased security standards.  Firstly, the US healthcare delivery system is comprised of four levels that are aimed at ensuring that patients are no longer considered to take the role of passive members of the healthcare industry, but advocates for the best administration of health facilities.  Additionally, healthcare should be capable of going beyond the usual health facilities through the use of infrastructure and other resources that give support to the health providers and understanding the political and economic environment in which the healthcare operates.

             Secondly, the HIPPA is argued to comprise of both pre-HIPPA and post-HIPPA.

The pre- HIPPA   stipulates the interaction between the four levels of healthcare which were argued to overlap in most cases. The post-HIPPA was stipulated as an electronic environment where it was difficult for paperwork to be received by individuals who were not supposed to see or receive it. Nevertheless, there were challenges that were associated with the post-HIPPA where it was found necessary to revise the old policy in order to keep up with the changing technologies and healthcare issues (HIPAA's Effects on US healthcare, 2009).

             Thirdly, there was the issue of business partners where there was a critical challenge in the HIPPA  legislation that showed the gap between the legislation and the changing world, which was later addressed through the use of complex internet facilities and applications resulting to a business partnership between the HIPPA and the internet providers.  As a result, there was a notable improvement in healthcare.

            Finally, the issue of security standards was analyzed where there was an increase in the HIPPA standard compliance particularly on the area of patient security. Recent research has argued that through these security standards, the HIPPA expects the US healthcare industry to take the initiative of ensuring that health records are treated the same way the federal government treats the national defense documents.

Ethical Considerations

            According to HIPPA, there would be complexity and penalties in case there was the creation of an environment that compelled the physician and medical centers to withhold information from those who had no right to it.  Moreover, the restriction on medical researchers reduced their performance in regard to the research in various ways. For instance, it was challenging to make follow- up contact on the patients’ welfare. The informed consent form that was necessary for the research comprised of, details pertaining to participant health information that was to be kept private.  In a general sense, while the information was crucial in the whole process, the addition of lengthy privacy section to documents that were initially complicated automatically led to increased user unfriendliness (HIPAA's Effects on US healthcare, 2009).

Statistical Analysis

             It is apparent that during an AHA study, it was confirmed that the hospital staff spent approximately $22.5 billion for a period of five years. This amount of money was known to cater to three privacy provisions that exceeded the actual estimated amount of $3.8 million by the government. Moreover, the cost of training medical practitioners was estimated to be $16 per staff member. The compliance cost of HIPPA per hospital ranges between $ 670,000 and $ 3,700, 000 which was alleged to be very expensive (HIPAA's Effects on US healthcare, 2009).

Conclusion

            It is worth noting that the HIPPA results coincide with the conclusion of the research where the hospitals were expected to carry out some training pertaining to the HIPPA guidelines and documentation that were necessary for the completion of the course. As such, hospitals came up with ways in which the training would be carried out where internal and external sources of training facilities were utilized exhaustively. In the end, the US healthcare was directly affected by the HIPPA increased documentation even though it was alleged to bring about complicated healthcare issues. 

             In regard to defining the problem, the research answered the problem comprehensively since it was capable of expounding on the social and economic impacts of  HIPPA  to healthcare in the U.S  although, the issue turned out to be expensive threatening to have a  negative impact to the health industry. Consequently, the conclusion was appropriate with the research that was carried out since it gave a summary of the impact of HIPPA on U.S healthcare.  

            The information provided by the research between the HIPPA  and the healthcare in the U.S  was efficient since it was able to give details pertaining to the two and how the HIPPA  further made an impact on healthcare especially through the post –HIPPA.