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Posts Tagged ‘personalization’

Dental Practice Marketing & HIPAA

Thursday, September 29th, 2022

Dental practices face enormous challenges when it comes to acquiring new patients and expanding their practices. Marketing is all but essential to make sure your practice thrives. This article discusses how dental practices can thrive using personalized marketing without running afoul of HIPAA regulations.

Dental Practice Marketing Today

Marketing is essential to growing any business successfully, but operating in highly regulated spaces such as dentistry, there are serious compliance considerations. Whether responding to an online patient review or trying to increase patient engagement through marketing campaigns, misunderstanding HIPAA can lead to patient privacy breaches that place your finances and reputation at risk.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which controls what and when patient information may be shared for marketing purposes, was enacted before the electronic age. As a result, it can be challenging to find information regarding appropriate marketing practices using modern social and software technologies.

Most Common Misunderstandings of HIPAA

HIPAA is a complicated set of rules and regulations. When it comes to patient marketing, there are many misconceptions about what is and isn’t allowed. Here we unpack a few of the most common misunderstandings as they apply to HIPAA-compliant marketing.

1. As long as patient consent is acquired, HIPAA doesn’t matter

Acquiring patient consent does not remove the organization’s obligation to secure protected health information (PHI) under the law. If PHI is improperly accessed, it is a breach and can lead to severe consequences.

2. Marketing emails do not need encryption

Many marketing emails imply a relationship between patients and providers and, as such, can often be classified as PHI. HIPAA regulations require PHI to be encrypted in transit and at rest.

3. Personalizing marketing emails is a HIPAA violation

Marketing emails can be personalized as long as the proper safeguards and precautions are in place to protect patient privacy and meet compliance requirements.

The Power of Marketing Personalization for Dental Practices

When using a HIPAA-compliant email marketing solution, you can leverage the data and information you have about your patients to increase engagement.

Improve marketing results and drive better patient outcomes by connecting to your patients with messaging that matters to them. Using PHI to segment and personalize emails delivers results for both your practice and your patients.

A Cautionary Tale

In May 2022, Dr. U. Phillip Igbinadolor, D.M.D. & Associates, a dental practice with offices in Charlotte and Monroe, North Carolina, allegedly impermissibly disclosed a patient’s protected health information on a webpage in response to a negative online review. The Office for Civil Rights imposed a $50,000 civil penalty.

Marketing Directly Impacts Practice Success

In the last decade, patients have significantly changed how they seek healthcare. Most patients now consult digital channels as a primary source of information when searching for new treatments and providers. The information they find via internet searches, social media, and review websites substantially influences their choice of provider. For dental marketers, this change has required a significant adjustment to their marketing strategies.

The Answer is a Fully Compliant Marketing Communications Solution

Starting a new marketing program requires the right tools. Do not choose a solution that prohibits you from using PHI in a way that is fully compliant.

How to Evaluate Secure Communications Solutions for Healthcare

Choosing the right email encryption solution is especially critical for dental organizations. HIPAA regulations, PHI risk, and improved patient engagement are absolute priorities. Not to mention the need for software that offers ease of use, simple integration, and high-level support.

Meet Compliance Requirements for Email

LuxSci’s Secure Connector adds a layer of protection to Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 email accounts. Don’t leave your organization’s security up to employees. Prevent breaches by securing sensitive data by default. LuxSci is HITRUST certified and can meet compliance requirements for HIPAA, SOC, GDPR, and more.

Conclusion: Online Marketing Isn’t Optional

Marketing your dental practice is no longer as simple as creating a listing in a directory or sending mail to potential patients. To remain competitive, practices must adopt online advertising techniques that offer a solid return on investment. The perils of possible HIPAA violations may dissuade some from taking the leap- but by properly vetting vendors, training staff, and selecting the right tools, it’s possible to engage patients and achieve results.

Tags: dental marketing, hipaa compliance, hipaa compliant marketing, hipaa marketing, personalization, quasi compliance
Posted in Email Marketing
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Healthcare Marketing & HIPAA: Are you in Compliance?

Wednesday, September 14th, 2022

Healthcare Marketing Today

Marketing is essential to growing any business successfully, but when you work in regulated spaces such as healthcare, there are compliance considerations. Whether responding to an online patient review or trying to increase patient engagement through marketing campaigns, misunderstandings in marketing best practices can lead to patient privacy breaches.

HIPAA and Healthcare Marketing

A large part of HIPAA regulates what is appropriate for the use or disclosure of patient information. There are certain instances where the use and disclosure of protected health information (PHI) is allowed without patient consent. These instances include sharing PHI for treatment, payment, or healthcare operations.

However, before you can use patient information for marketing efforts, you need to receive explicit written consent from the patient. The consent form must be specific to the marketing efforts you will use the patient’s PHI in. For instance, if you would like to share patient testimonials, photos, or videos on your website or social media accounts, the patient must sign a consent form stating that you will use their information in this way.

HIPAA-compliant marketing also largely depends on an employee’s understanding of the law. Employees responsible for handling PHI must be trained to use and disclose PHI within the scope of their job role. Improperly trained employees can expose your practice to HIPAA violations and costly fines.

8 Common Misunderstandings of Marketing and HIPAA

1. As long as patient consent is obtained, HIPAA doesn’t matter
Some organizations think they can use any marketing tool with a signed patient consent form. Still, the tool has to be HIPAA-compliant. Even if patients agree, it does not remove the organization’s obligations to secure PHI under the law. If protected health information is improperly accessed, it is still a breach and can lead to severe financial and reputational consequences.

2. Marketing emails do not need encryption
Many marketing emails imply a relationship between patients and providers and, as such, can often be classified as protected health information. PHI must be encrypted in transit and at rest to comply with HIPAA.

3. Personalizing marketing emails is a HIPAA violation
Marketing emails can be personalized as long as the proper safeguards and precautions are in place to protect patient privacy and meet compliance requirements.

4. Marketing companies do not need to sign Business Associates Agreements
As of 2013, the HIPAA Omnibus rule expanded HIPAA obligations to include business associates and subcontractors. Marketing agencies and vendors that process PHI on behalf of a covered entity must comply with HIPAA regulations, which include signing a BAA.

5. The only way to protect PHI is to use patient portals
TLS encryption meets HIPAA transport encryption requirements and provides a better user experience. Marketing emails sent with TLS encryption are more likely to be opened than those sent to a patient portal.

6. Using BCC is enough to keep patient identities private
BCC is NOT enough to protect patient identities. Although the end recipient cannot tell who else received the message, the entire list is visible as the messages are transmitted from server to server. The messages can be eavesdropped on by someone with technical abilities.

7. Always respond to social media reviews
Be extremely careful when responding to online reviews. Publicly confirming information about a patient’s health or treatment status is a HIPAA violation.

8. Healthcare marketing isn’t necessary or worth the hassle
Healthcare consumerism is rising, and patients are willing to change providers if they are unsatisfied with their experience. Educating and informing current and potential patients about your services is essential to improve new customer acquisition and retention.

How to be HIPAA-Compliant

The most crucial step is vetting marketing vendors and HIPAA compliance tools. Any vendor that handles PHI on behalf of a healthcare entity needs to sign a Business Associate Agreement that outlines how patient data will be stored, transmitted, and disposed of. Don’t choose a vendor who is unfamiliar with HIPAA’s stringent requirements. Also, watch out for quasi-compliance. Some self-identified “HIPAA-compliant” vendors can protect data at rest but not in transmission or require patient waivers to achieve compliance.

Next, always use encryption and default to security. Identifying PHI is often tricky, and the legal burden should not fall on the marketing team. By selecting technology that encrypts every marketing email, you can rest assured that messages are secure and compliant. A bonus tip- do not send marketing messages to an encrypted patient portal. Instead, send marketing messages with TLS encryption directly to patients’ inboxes. You will see much higher response rates and engagement.

Finally, to create the most effective marketing campaigns, use PHI to create segmented audiences and send them personalized content. These tactics are widely used outside the healthcare industry because they deliver results. *Remember that any tool you put PHI into must be HIPAA-compliant.

How LuxSci and Compliancy Group Can Help

LuxSci’s Secure Marketing tool is an email marketing platform designed to meet HIPAA requirements. It allows marketing teams to segment audiences and personalizes emails to engage patients and improve marketing ROI. If you are already using a third-party email marketing platform, no worries, we got you covered. LuxSci’s Secure High Volume Email solution can integrate with any third-party platform to make sure those emails are also HIPAA-compliant.

Compliancy Group enables healthcare organizations and vendors serving the healthcare industry to achieve HIPAA compliance through an automated software platform and live guided coaching. The Guard, its proprietary compliance platform, covers all the necessary parts of the HIPAA regulation. Compliancy Group awards clients the HIPAA Seal of Compliance upon successful completion of their process. The Seal can be displayed on a practice’s website, email signature, and signage, and proves they are dedicated to protecting patient information and have completed the steps required to satisfy the law.

Tags: business associate, business associate agreement, email encryption, email marketing, ePHI, healthcare marketing, mutual consent, patient consent, personalization, social media
Posted in Collaboration, Email Marketing
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Personalize Healthcare Communications to Improve the Patient Experience

Tuesday, August 16th, 2022

Recent survey results from CVS Health indicate that healthcare patients desire a more personalized healthcare experience. Over the last ten years, the online experience has become highly customized. Online vendors have more customer data and use it to extend personalized offers, reminders, and updates. Although people are concerned about online privacy, they are more likely to open and engage with relevant marketing communications.

As the healthcare industry has undergone digital transformation, more data is available in a digital format. But how and when can it be used? This article discusses how to use patient data to personalize healthcare communications without violating HIPAA requirements.

What is Healthcare Personalization?

Personalized health care places individuals at the center of the health care experience. Health care is a complex issue, and one system does not work for everyone. A person’s health status is influenced by many factors, including genetics, age, environment, social determinants, income, and countless others. A health care program that considers as many of these variables as possible can better address patient needs and increase access to care.

Why Personalize Healthcare Communications

Patients understand that their healthcare providers manage a lot of their personal data and want a personalized experience that respects their preferences. As audience segmentation and personalization techniques become more common in other industries like e-commerce and personal care, consumers expect the same experiences from their health care providers.

For example, say you order a jug of laundry detergent on Amazon. They can use common consumer data in combination with your last order date to estimate when you are likely to run out. Then, they can send an email reminder to encourage a reorder before you run out again. In a similar manner, healthcare providers should know when someone’s prescription is running low and could send a notification to let the patient they need to refill and help improve medication adherence.

A recent survey by CVS Health found that 85% of patients find personalized care to be important. In fact, 83% expect their primary care provider to be aware of their family medical history, genetics and inherited lifestyle habits. 71% of consumers said it was very or somewhat important to their health that they have customized alerts and reminders of screenings and checkups. This is even more common among patients under 40. The next generation of healthcare consumers expects their healthcare to fit seamlessly into their normal lives.

Ways to Personalize the Healthcare Experience

There are many ways to personalize the healthcare experience, but they all depend on the available data. An easy way to start is by asking for patient preferences. Some common ways to personalize healthcare communications include collecting information about patient preferences:

Communication methods: How do they prefer to be contacted? Ask patients their preferred channels- email, texting, phone, and paper notifications are standard options.
Language proficiency: Is English their first language? If not, send communications in the person’s primary language.
Patient status: Are they active patients or overdue for regular screenings and appointments?

Looking at these attributes can help craft messages that appeal to patient subgroups.

The next level of personalization uses protected health information (PHI) to deliver extremely customized healthcare communications. The possibilities are truly endless, but here are a few examples to spark some ideas:

Medical conditions: use information about patient medical conditions to send highly targeted communications about managing or preventing chronic conditions like depression, diabetes, and heart conditions.
Screening reminders: Remind patients when they are due for mammograms, colonoscopies, or other screenings that are ordered based on age or risk factors.
Patient retention and re-engagement: Did a patient skip their annual appointment or screening? Make it easy to reschedule by sending periodic reminders.
Insurance status: send relevant communications based on the patient’s insurance status. For example, letting healthcare marketplace insurance holders know about re-enrollment periods to ensure they don’t drop their coverage.

Personalization provides a customizable healthcare experience for patients that eliminates friction and barriers to care. Using personalization to create educational campaigns can also help improve health outcomes. See How to Use ePHI to Segment and Personalize Email Marketing Campaigns for more information.

HIPAA Considerations in Customizable Healthcare

One reason that healthcare has been slow to adopt personalization techniques is HIPAA. These guidelines protect sensitive medical information and govern how it can be used. To send personalized messages like the examples discussed above, HIPAA guidelines must be followed. Some of the core requirements for sending HIPAA-compliant emails include:

Encryption
Access Controls
Backups and Archival
Anti-Malware Defenses
Identity Authorization
Reporting Mechanisms
Review Procedures and Policies

See our HIPAA-Compliant Email Checklist for more information about the requirements.

LuxSci offers several solutions for sending HIPAA-compliant personalized messages. Contact us today to learn more about our Secure High Volume Email and Secure Marketing tools.

Tags: digital transformation, email marketing, ePHI, HIPAA email, patient engagement, patient experience, personalization, segmentation
Posted in Email Marketing
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