Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a set of rules to be followed by health plans, doctors, hospitals and other health care providers. HIPPA took effect on April 14, 2003. Key provisions include: Patients must be able access their record and correct errors Patients must be informed of how their personal information will be used. Patient information can only be shared if needed to treat the patient. In particular, it cannot be used for marketing purposes. Patients can ask their health plans and providers to take reasonable steps to ensure that their communications with the patient are confidential. For instance, a patient can ask to be called on his work number, instead of home or cell phone number. Patients can file formal privacy-related complaints to the HHS' Office for Civil Rights. Health plans or providers must document their privacy procedures, but they have a lot of freedom on what to include in their privacy procedure. Health plans or providers must designated a privacy officer and train their employees. External Links Office for Civil Rights page on HIPAA This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.