Because of the HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) laws, doctor-patient confidentiality is more important than ever. As such, one of the most important parts of development in mobile medical technology has to do with providing HIPAA compliant communication between physicians. That includes secure text messaging, and secure SMS as well, when physicians send records to one another.
Title I of HIPAA protects health insurance coverage for workers and their families when they change or lose their jobs. Furthermore, the HIPAA Privacy Rule deals with both the use and disclosure of protected health information (or PHI) held by entities like health care clearinghouses, employee sponsored health plans, health insurers and medical service providers that engage in certain transactions with patients.
According to a Commonwealth Fund study, doctors in Denmark reported that in the late 1990s, they were saving an average of 30 minutes a day by prescribing drugs and ordering lab reports electronically. Obviously in this day and age, there are healthcare apps and mobile healthcare technology solutions that allow doctors to prescribe medications and send records to pharmacies and other physicians, but this needs to be done securely.
There are 551 certified medical information medical information software companies in the United States, and together they sell a total of about 1,137 software programs. Most health care professionals invest in secure systems that are HIPAA compliant so they can avoid lawsuits and maintain a high level of integrity for their patients. At the end of the day however, it remains highly important that doctors and other medical care professionals follow all the HIPAA laws when communicating with one another, even through secure text messaging.