The acronym “HIPAA” has become a household name since the enactment of the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, which, among other things, established rules for protecting and securing patients’ health information. In fact, it is not uncommon to hear about breaches of patient information costing healthcare providers and suppliers six and seven figure civil monetary penalties or settlements. Typically, such settlements and penalties have arisen out of patient complaints that the privacy of their protected health information (PHI) has been compromised. However, beginning November 2011, patient complaints will not be the only way in which the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Civil Rights (OCR) will learn about non-compliant entities.Section 13411 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which established the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, requires the Secretary of HHS to “provide for periodic audits to ensure...

On August 22, 2011, as a result of a directive from President Obama, the US Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) issued its Plan for Retrospective Review of Existing Rules (“Plan”). The Plan includes a review from all HHS operating and staff divisions (e.g., the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”)) that establish, administer and/or enforce regulation. HHS’ Plan aims to review “existing significant regulations to identify those rules that can be eliminated as obsolete, unnecessary, burdensome, or counterproductive or that can be modified to be more effective, efficient, flexible, and streamlined.” While, on its face, a review of unnecessary regulations appears to be beneficial, looking below the surface reveals that the review may create fundamental changes in medical and anesthesia practice. CMS is contemplating reviewing the conditions of participation (“CoPs”) for anesthesia services (42 CFR 482.52) to eliminate the certified registered nurse anesthetist (“CRNA”) supervision requirement, which could...