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Part 1: Learning About HIPAA (FAQ 8 of 65)

 

8. What's a Health Record?

HIPAA introduces the term protected health information or PHI. The actual definition is a conglomeration of nested and complex terms with even longer exceptions. It is too messy to bother with here. Instead, we offer a rule of thumb that will work just fine most of the time.

Rule of thumb:

Any information that a covered entity (e.g., health care provider or insurer) has about you is PHI. It doesn't matter if the information is medical, financial, or otherwise. We tend to use the more traditional term -- health record or medical record -- here, but we mean PHI.

SIDEBAR:

A common myth about the HIPAA privacy rule is that it only covers electronic information. That is false. The health privacy rule applies to PHI in any form or medium. If a covered entity records your information on paper, computer disk, or tree bark, it is subject to HIPAA. However, the HIPAA security rule only applies to electronic Protected Health Information. For more on covered entities, see FAQ 9.

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