HIPAA Compliance Consulting, Audit &
Certification Services in Saudi Arabia

What is HIPAA?

HIPAA – the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, is a US law that is aimed at providing data privacy and security measures to protect medical information. Established in 1996, it was created to ensure that sensitive health information of patients is not disclosed without their explicit knowledge or consent.

It was issued by the HHS, the US Department of Health and Human Services and required standards to be created on a national level for protection of patient health information. HIPAA specifically aims at protecting a part of the information covered by the Privacy Rule. The standards of this rule deal with the usage and disclosure of health information of patients by entities to whom the Privacy Rule applies.

The individual health info is called PHI or protected health information, and the entities are ‘covered entities’. The HIPAA has two main goals: providing continuous health insurance cover for employees who lose or change their jobs, and reducing healthcare costs through the standardization of e-transmission of transactions whether financial or administrative. It also aims to deal with waste, fraud, and abuse in both the delivery of healthcare and health insurance, along with providing better access to health insurance and long-term healthcare. In short, HIPAA aims at ensuring protection of patient health information without impeding the flow of health information required to deliver and promote outstanding healthcare.

Although HIPAA is US law, it is highly relevant to Saudi healthcare organizations and businesses that handle US-linked patient data, partner with US providers, or serve US patients. Visible Stars helps these organizations in Saudi Arabia build HIPAA-aligned data protection practices.