Part of Lesson Plan: HIPAA Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996.

Activity Overview / Details

When patients first come into the office they sign a "notice of privacy".  What we are deciding now is whether the patients need to sign an additional form for release of  PHI.  If it is to do with "TPO" - Treatment Payment & Operations they do not need to sign anything else.

Treatment is when patients are treated, (such as taking blood pressure), payments are anything having to do with payments, (such as insurance forms), operations are anything that happens in-house to run the operation, (such as filing).

Have students come up with examples of treatment _______, Payment__________ & Operations________

Patients do need to sign for release of information that is NOT part of TPO.

Examples would be to send information to another doctor who is not part of the group, or to a lawyer.