Medical Office Administrators and HIPAA

What Medical Office Administrators Need to Know About HIPAA

The medical field thrives on trust. Besides entrusting medical professionals with their well-being, patients also need to be able to trust that their sensitive private information is secure when they visit a doctor’s office, clinic, or hospital. That’s where HIPAA comes in. If you’re considering pursuing a career in medical office administration, you’ll be dealing with information covered by HIPAA on a daily basis, so it’s critical that you understand how it works.

In this article, we’ll explain the basics on HIPAA to help you decide whether a career as a medical office administrator is right for you.

What is HIPAA?

HIPAA stands for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Originally passed into law in 1996, it lays out rules and policies that the healthcare industry must follow to protect patients’ sensitive health information. 

The primary goal of HIPAA is to ensure healthcare providers control access to patient-protected health information. It also penalizes healthcare providers and other companies in the health industry for failing to keep patients’ covered health information private. 

Virtually everyone connected to the healthcare industry has certain obligations under HIPAA, including students, insurance companies, billing companies, employees, patients, healthcare providers, and those who maintain electronic medical records.

What Do Medical Office Administrators Do?

The typical job duties of medical office administrators include but are not limited to:

1. Checking patients in for appointments
2. Processing patient information, payments, and billing insurance companies
3. Customer service tasks that include scheduling and canceling appointments, answering calls professionally, and providing complete and accurate responses to inquiries
4. Documenting and storing patient information such as demographics and clinical details in electronic health information systems. 

Do I Need to Be Trained in HIPAA to Be a Medical Office Administrator?

Yes, knowledge of HIPAA is typically required for medical office administration jobs. A big part of your responsibilities in such a position will be scheduling appointments, maintaining patient records, and processing payments and insurance claims. In the course of these duties, you’ll inevitably end up dealing with a lot of sensitive patient care information covered under HIPAA.

Therefore, to work as a medical office administrator, you’ll need to be thoroughly familiar with the proper procedures for handling this information to prevent unauthorized disclosures and minimize the risk of patient info being exposed to data breaches.  

Training For Medical Office Administrator Jobs With ICT

At Interactive College of Technology, we provide hands-on training that gives students real-world experience handling numerous administrative tasks such as managing medical records, billing and coding, and ordering supplies. Our medical office administrator program trains you in crucial procedures for staying compliant with HIPAA, OSHA, and JCAHO regulations. We offer a 135-hour school externship in a healthcare facility to give you the skills and experience. At the end of the program, our lifetime career placement support helps students find medical office jobs in different healthcare settings. 

For more information, get in touch with us and start your journey towards a dynamic and impactful career in the healthcare industry.

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