The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced that University of Washington Medicine (UWM) has agreed to settle charges it “potentially violated the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Security Rule by failing to implement policies and procedures to prevent, detect, contain and correct security violations,” according to an HHS press release. The settlement levies a $750,000 fine, “a corrective action plan and annual reports on the organization’s compliance efforts.” Office for Civil Rights Director Jocelyn Samuels said, “All too often we see covered entities with a limited risk analysis that focuses on a specific system such as the electronic medical record or that fails to provide appropriate oversight and accountability for all parts of the enterprise.” She added, “An effective risk analysis is one that is comprehensive in scope and is conducted across the organization to sufficiently address the risks and vulnerabilities to patient data.”
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