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Why You Need Policies and Procedures

Posted on March 15, 2022 by Jean Eaton in Blog

Why You Need Health Information Policies and Procedures

Maybe you’ve heard you need written policies and procedures for your health information, but you’re left asking yourself why it’s so important?

The truth is, without written policies and procedures, you open a healthcare practice up to a whole host of problems, including major legal issues.

In fact, every business needs good practices that apply to your:

  • Information that you collect from patients/clients
  • Website
  • Email
  • Business practices including electronic (or paper) patient records, and computer network
  • Financial information
  • Billing, collection, and payment processing

Within the healthcare industry, there are additional legislation requirements that require specific written health information policies and procedures.

The Health Information Act (HIA) and the Personal Information Privacy Act (PIPA)

As we mentioned, when a custodian collects health information, you must follow the Health Information Act (HIA) in Alberta.

Like most other private businesses in Alberta, private healthcare practices must also comply with the Personal Information Privacy Act (PIPA).

The colleges of regulated health professionals (like the Alberta Dental Association and College (ADAC) and the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta (CPSA), require dentists and physicians to meet the standards of practice which includes compliance to HIA and PIPA legislation.

In addition, the college has other standards of practice that you must meet, including policies and procedures for the collection, use, disclosure, and access of health information.

So, let’s explore further why written policies and procedures are so essential, as well as what can happen without them, and why healthcare practices may not think they need them in the first place.

Benefits of Policies and Procedures

One of the most critical benefits of having policies and procedures in place is that they’re good for business.

Here’s how:

  • They contribute to consistent, efficient workflow.
  • You can figure it out once, write the procedure, tweak it to make it better, and then repeat the same procedure again and again.
  • They help you make better business decisions, like buying supplies, choosing services, and selecting vendors.
  • They help support your accreditation efforts.
  • On-boarding employees the right way with no missed steps is much easier with policies and procedures in place.

If you’re looking for even more proof of the benefits of having written procedures, it can also help you avoid:

  • Internal disputes within your team and external disputes with your patients and clients
  • Re-work and re-training employees
  • Poor customer service
  • Poor reputation
  • Fines and penalties

Fines And Penalties For Not Having Written Policies And Procedures

Fines for not having policies and proceduresYou might be wondering why you would face fines and penalties for not having written policies and procedures in the first place.

The HIA requires the custodian – which includes the physician, pharmacist, dentist or dental hygienist – to take reasonable safeguards to protect the privacy and confidentiality of patients’ health information.

Having written policies and procedures is a common, expected, and reasonable safeguard.

Let’s say you have a privacy breach in your practice or an error (like sending a fax to the wrong number or you are a victim of a phishing or ransomware attack).

You can learn more about what makes a privacy breach a privacy breach here.

If you can’t demonstrate that you had the appropriate reasonable safeguards, like written policies and procedures in place, you are guilty of an offence under the law.

It’s illegal not to have policies and procedures when you collect health information.

If you are guilty of this offence, you are liable for a fine of a minimum of $2,000 and not more than $500,000. (HIA section 107(7)).

3 Policies and Procedures Myths

One reason some healthcare practices fail to have written policies and procedures is because they believe they don’t need them.

Often, this is because they’ve fallen prey to the common myths about policies and procedures.

There are 3 of the common myths that stop healthcare providers and their clinic managers from creating written policies and procedures:

  1. It’s Too Hard

While it does take some skill to write clear, easy to read, and easy to understand policies and procedures, it doesn’t have to be heard. In fact, you can even purchase templates to make this easier.

  1. It Takes Too Much Time

Writing policies and procedures does take some time.

But investing the time to create policies and procedures pays off by preventing suffering from inconsistent or broken procedures, using or disclosing health information in error, and having to pay fines, penalties, public relations nightmares, or spending the time required to run a privacy or security investigation.

  1. It’s A Waste Of Time

Here are a few good reasons that prove writing policies and procedures is not a waste of time:

  • Practical privacy policies and procedures will create a more efficient practice and help you make better business decisions.
  • The policies and procedures become the foundation of your privacy impact assessment.
  • Policies and procedures are pre-requisites for other initiatives, like access to Netcare or other community integration initiatives, and privacy impact assessment (PIA). Click here to learn more about PIAs.
  • You must have them as part of your legislative compliance.
  • It’s the law. Not having policies and procedures regarding the collection, use, disclosure, and access of health information is illegal.

As you can see, written policies and procedures help ensure consistent office procedures and good communication between team members in your healthcare practice.

In addition to those good reasons, you must have good written policies and procedures about how you collect, use, disclose, and provide access to health information to avoid legal problems, fees, penalties, and other problems.

 

Not Sure Which Policies and Procedures That You Need?

Show Me Policy And Procedure Checklist

Did you enjoy this article? If you’d like to look at similar posts, visit these links:

Do You Know Where Your Policies and Procedures Are? 

Why Do You Need Health Information Policies and Procedures?

Healthcare Policies And Procedures: Essential in EVERY Practice

New! Health Information Policy and Procedure Manuals

Privacy Impact Assessments (PIA)

 

Alberta, clinic, custodian, health, Health Information Act, healthcare, HIA, medical, physicians, PIPA, Policies and procedures, privacy, Privacy Impact Assessment, reasonable safeguards

Healthcare Policies And Procedures

Posted on November 30, 2020 by Jean Eaton in Blog

Healthcare Policies and Procedures: What Are They and Why Do Practices Need Them?

 

Healthcare policies and procedures are essential tools in EVERY healthcare practice.

We use written policies and procedures to ensure consistent office procedures and good communication between team members, but it doesn’t stop there.

Before we get to the many benefits of healthcare policies and procedures, let’s cover exactly what these terms mean.

Not sure which policies and procedures you need? Click here to find out!

Policies and Procedures Defined

For our purposes today, this is what we mean by these terms:

Policy: A set of ideas or plans that is used as a basis for making decisions.

Procedure: A fixed, step-by-step sequence of activities or course of action.

Both policies and procedures serve several important purposes in a healthcare practice.

Policies and procedures can help you:

  • Protect your practice with consistency in decision making and implementing routine tasks.
  • Provide team members direction and guidelines; help avoid micromanaging. Here’s more information on how policy and procedure checklists help with employee privacy and security.
  • Ensure quality and cost-effective processes.
  • Well thought out policies and procedures reduce re-work and make for more efficient practices.
  • Encourage team members to work to their full scope of responsibilities.
  • Contribute to compliance, including professional standards, HIA, insurance.
  • Protect your healthcare practice by demonstrating your administrative safeguards.

As powerful and effective as policies and procedures can be, they can also pose certain problems or risks if they’re not implemented properly — or if they don’t exist in the first place.

On that note, if you have policies and procedures in place, it’s also imperative to know where they are. Don’t miss this cautionary tale where I tell you why.

If your policies and procedures are unclear or non-existent, these are some of the risks you expose a healthcare practice to:

  • Fines and even jail time for the healthcare provider
  • Increased conflict and potential for misunderstanding within a practice
  • Increased conflict between employees, misunderstanding, and poor customer service
  • Poor business decisions and wasted time and money

Simply talking about your policies and procedures is not a good business strategy! You need to have clear healthcare policies and procedures in place if you want to reap all of their benefits.

So, let’s go over what makes a good healthcare policy with a clear and effective design.

Policies ask WHY and WHAT

Policies are the steps to put your goals into action — policies are proactive.

The WHY: Why is this policy needed? It is the general guide for decision-making.

The WHAT: What do you want to show for programs, activities, and services?

Each year, policies need to be reviewed and authorized by the clinic manager, privacy officer, healthcare provider and/or owners. Your team members need the opportunity to review and understand the policies regularly, too.

Review policies to assure that they reflect what the clinic is doing and that the clinic is following the written policy. Changes may need to be completed and approved.

Now, let’s cover what makes for good procedures before we get to how to create your manual.

Procedures ask HOW

The HOW: How you plan to carry out the objectives and details listed in your policies?

Your procedures should include sufficient detail so a new employee can complete a task based on the information provided.

We’ve discussed the objectives of your policies and procedures for your healthcare practice, now here are some useful tips for actually creating your policies and procedures manual:

  1. Include screen prints if computer-based.
  2. Include video explanations.
  3. Format the policy and procedures so that each policy or procedure is a separate, stand-alone document.
  4. Assign a NUMBER to each policy and procure to make it easy to reference in your PIA, or direct your staff to review. You can use any numbering system that you want — I usually use a sequential numbering system.
  5. Headings make it easier to group your information which makes it easier for the reader to review and then focus on the details that they need. Repeat the same headings throughout the policies and procedures to provide consistency across the manual. Use the headings as needed; not all policies or procedures need all the headings.
  6. Cite legislative and standards requirements, like the HIA.

When you’re implementing changes to these policies and procedures or creating them in the first place, be sure to involve key parties. This includes:

  • Custodian/trustee/business owner
  • Clinic manager/team lead
  • Privacy officer

Remember, implementing a new procedure or policy successfully must always include training and discussion with your team.

Which Privacy and Security Policies and Procedures Do YOU Need?

Without well-documented, written policies and procedures, you open your healthcare practice up to a whole host of problems, including major legal issues.

Does your clinic have appropriate policies and procedures?

Not sure which policies and procedures you need? Click here to find out!

Get the Reliability And Power of Policy and Procedure Templates Without Spending Hours (or Days) Creating Them!

Your healthcare practice needs written policies and procedures to assist you to correctly, efficiently, and confidently collect, use, access, and disclosure of health information so that you can meet your accreditation, privacy impact assessment, and regulatory compliance requirements.

Now For Medical, Dental, Chiropractic and Nursing, Too!

  • Starting with a template saves you time and money
  • Be privacy and security compliant
  • No special software to buy or learn
  • Use your existing MS Word and MS Excel office productivity software
  • One-time fee
  • On-line support
  • Available now!

Click the >> arrow to watch a short demo of the robust manual you can create quicker than you thought possible!

Show Me Policy And Procedure Templates!

Different Policy and Procedure versions available for your specific type of healthcare practice

Medical Doctor Health Information Policy and Procedure

Medical Practice

Dental Practice Health Information Policy and Procedure

Dental Practice

Chiropractor Health Information Policies and Procedures

NEW!
Chiropractic Practice

Nurse Practitioner Health Information Policy and Procedure

NEW!
Nurse Practitioner Practice

Registered Nurse Health Information Policy and Procedure

NEW!
Registered Nurse Practice

Health Information Policy and Procedure Manuals ready for you now!

Step 1: Complete the questionnaire and download the templates

Step 2: Easily generate draft 24+ policies and 28+ procedures and forms using MS Word

Step 3: Edit the documents

Step 4: Video coaching and best practices for the policies and procedures and implementation tips

Step 5: Customize for your healthcare practice

Step 6: Video orientation for your employees

Show Me Policy And Procedure Templates!

Did you enjoy this article? If you’d like to look at similar posts, visit these links:

Do You Know Where Your Policies And Procedures Are?

Why Do You Need Health Information Policies and Procedures?

New! Health Information Policy and Procedure Manuals

Safeguards: The What, Why, and How

When Do You Need a PIA Amendment?

When is a Privacy Breach a Privacy Breach?

clinic, custodian, health, Health Information Act, healthcare, HIA, medical, physicians, PIPA, Policies and procedures, Privacy Impact Assessment, reasonable safeguards

PIPA is extended for 6 months

Posted on November 11, 2014 by Jean Eaton in Blog

On October 30, the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) granted a six-month extension which will allow the Government of Alberta to make amendments to the Personal Information Protection Act, 2003 (PIPA).

Yesterday’s decision was welcomed by Alberta’s Information and Privacy Commissioner Jill Clayton, “If PIPA is allowed to lapse, Alberta’s citizens and businesses will lose the unique benefits afforded by the legislation, including: mandatory breach reporting and notification to affected individuals, local enforcement without court involvement, and protection for the access and privacy rights of employees of provincially-regulated private sector businesses.”

PIPA applies to not for profit and private business sector in Alberta.  For more information about PIPA, join us at the PIPA Conference in Calgary Nov 13-14.

Alberta, PIPA

PIPA Legislation Submission

Posted on January 15, 2014 by Jean Eaton in Blog
PACC logo

The Supreme Court of Canada recently declared that Alberta's Personal Information Privacy Act (PIPA) is in breach of s. 1 of the Charter. The Alberta legislature must now decide how to make the legislation constitutionally compliant.

PACC is a national, non‑partisan, non-profit association and the leading organization in Canada that is dedicated to access and privacy in both the private sector and the public sector. PACC is the certifying body for access and privacy professionals, and engages in outreach efforts to advance awareness about access to information and data privacy in Canada.

PACC is dedicated to ensuring the independent autonomy of Canada’s access and privacy professionals to administer Canadian privacy legislation, while directly and impartially addressing the needs of industry, the public and private sectors.  PACC is preparing a submission to the review process and invites you to participate.  For more information or to become a member of the PACC, visit www.PACC-CCAP.ca or their newsletter.

Questions to consider:     What aspects of PIPA should remain unchanged, and why? What will be the positive and negative consequences of preserving these aspects as they now are.     What aspects of PIPA should change, and in what way? What will be the practical effect of your proposed changes.     What, if any, aspects of PIPA (Alberta), PIPA (BC), and PIPEDA ought to remain unique? What, if any, ought to use consistent language or definitions?

Alberta, PACC, PIPA, privacy legislation

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It is a rare privilege to work with an authentic expert who fulfills their role of consultant and coach with curiosity and respect for the specific nature of their client's unique enterprise. Jean Eaton was always prepared, sat every meeting on time, listened to an endless barrage of questions and answered every one with patience, grace, and wise counsel. The end product Information Managers Ltd provided ECHO Health was exceptional; their ongoing support will be a large measure of our success going forward. I highly recommend their services.

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