HIPAA and Reearch: How Have the Firt Two Year Gone? Original Reearch Article

Purpoe To ae the impact of the Health Inurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) on reearch in ophthalmology. Deign A peronal perpective with a review of relevant publication. Method Review of experience at a ingle intitution a it tranitioned to enforcing HIPAA guideline. Reult HIPAA ha been cotly to intitution and will continue to be o. At John Hopkin alone, nearly 26,000 employee have had to take HIPAA compliance training and pa examination with an overall etimated cot of nearly $2 million in the firt year. At the ame time, complying with HIPAA regulation ha increaed intitutional awarene of privacy iue. Concluion HIPAA ha added a layer of regulation to reearch that ha increaed the burden of reearcher but i unlikely to prevent mot reearch from taking place. Although there are clear benefit to the heightened awarene of the implication of reearch on tudy ubject’ privacy, the cot of implementing HIPAA have been very high, and further refinement are likely neceary.