Data Security in Healthcare
In the world of technology today, consumers often purchase items through the internet using their personal information such as name, date of birth and credit card numbers. This information can easily be stolen from someone who seeks to exploit weakness in a computer network. According, to (Gagne, 2012), “data breaches often occur through technical vulnerabilities, malware, compromised user credentials or opportunist attackers”. Healthcare organizations maintain patient medical and personal information through an electronic source called the electronic health record. Healthcare quality and safety requires that the right information be available at the right time to support patient care and health system management decisions. Data breaches in healthcare have become common within the last few years which is a violation of the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act of 1996 and patient privacy. Data security is a major concern pertaining to consumers choosing a health care organization to fit their needs. Care providers and insurance companies face the increased enforcement of regulatory requirements to ensure patients of their personal information secure. The key steps to achieving data security in healthcare organizations is to following policies and procedure, conduct audit trails, data classification, data protection, encryption and disaster recovery/business continuity.
Every healthcare organizations must comply with the privacy and security rules to protect patient identifiable information. Patient identifiable information is confidential therefore policies are in place to ensure that organizations security message cuts across departments. A Data breach is defined by the Department of Human Services as an “impermissible use or disclosure under the privacy rule that compromises the security or privacy of the protected health information.” The Office for Civil Rights and the