1. Puerto Rico Community Network for Clinical Research on AIDS (PR CoNCRA) Río Piedras, Puerto Rico Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA): What does it mean to us and our Experience up-to-Now” Presented by: Rosaura López Fontánez, MSW/LCSW Executive Director

2. HIPPA:What does it mean? “Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA). Became a law in 1996. Our First Encounter was a large and scary newspaper announcement by Compliance Health Consulting Corp., offering orientation and assistance.

3. Reason for Creating “HIPPA” US Congress wants to establish national standards for electronic heath care transactions and codes. Our experience has been that in order to meet these standards and comply with the law, it will be time consuming and very costly.

4. How will this be done? By Centralizing all standards, and applying penalties and/or incarceration if compliance is not meet. Our experience has been getting to know the basics of the law, making “Compliance” a priority on our list, and requesting assistance by the “experts” in the field (compliance consulting groups), and clearinghouses that are HIPPA compliance.

5. The Law HIPPA The law is composed of five areas that regulate the Health Services Industry: * Administrative Simplification * Electronic Transaction and Code sets standards * Privacy and Security Our experience up-to-now has been: * Implementing an organizational strategy * HIPPA Awareness Education Program for staff * Completing an Operational Assessment Phase * Development and Testing Phase

6. Clearinghouses Provides HIPPA Compliance Testing and Certify that Health Care Organization are compliant with the requirements of HIPPA Legislation.