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HIPAA Guidelines

As health care providers, and as one of its covered entities, nurses must be knowledgeable about the various aspects of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). United States University CONHS offers the guidance below for those persons to ensure compliance with those requirements and asks that all students sign the HIPAA Confidentiality Agreement (Appendix C).

  1. Sign the HIPAA Confidentiality Agreement before any involvement in a clinical agency. 

  2. Attend HIPAA training or in-classroom clinical instruction on requirements relating to patient privacy. 

  3. Know and adhere to a clinical site’s privacy and procedures before undertaking any activities at the site.

  4. Maintain the confidentiality of any patient information at all times. 

  5. Promptly report any violation of those procedures, applicable law, or HIPAA Confidentiality Agreement by a CONHS student, faculty, or staff member to the appropriate CONHS clinical coordinator or clinical faculty member. 

  6. Understand that a violation of the clinical site’s policies and procedures, of applicable law, or HIPAA Confidentiality Agreement will subject the student to disciplinary action. Students and faculty are not to do the following: 

    1. Discuss, use, or disclose any patient information while in the clinical setting or outside of clinical unless it is part of the clinical setting. 

    2. Remove any record from the clinical site without the prior written authorization of that site. 

    3. Disclose patient information to anyone other than the health-care staff of the clinical site. 

    4. Use patient information in the context of a learning experience, classroom case presentation, class assignment, or research without attempting to exclude as much of the following information as possible: 

      1. Names (Initials are sufficient)

      2. Geographical subdivisions smaller than a state 

      3. Dates of birth, admission, discharge, death 

      4. Telephone and fax numbers 

      5. E-mail addresses 

      6. Social security numbers 

      7. Medical records or account numbers 

      8. Certificate/license numbers

      9. Vehicle or device numbers 

      10. Web locators/Internet protocols

      11. Biometric identifiers xii Full face identifiers

      12. Any other unique identifying number, characteristic, or code 

      13. All ages over 89 

    5. Access any patient information unless the patient is part of your clinical assignment. 

    6. Disclose any Personal Health Information (PHI) to any entity not requiring PHI for health care purposes without their consent.