This Policy Manual addresses compliance with federal and state law concerning privacy of medical records for your clinical care Center.

The HIPAA Privacy Rule sets standards that apply to records held by health care providers across the nation. State law sets standards for records held by doctors, hospitals and other health care providers within the state. Most health care providers must follow both the HIPAA Privacy Rule and state law. We have used Massachusetts law as an example of applicable state law. Therefore, if you hire legal counsel to tailor this form document to your situation, then your attorney may search for the Massachusetts law examples as illustrations of places where specific state law should be inserted.

For your convenience, we have highlighted sections of the Manual to which you should pay particular attention (i.e., names and dates relevant to you), and have highlighted updates relating to 2009 federal legislation (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009).

The file is provided as a Word document for easy editing.