No single word, phrase or acronym strikes more fear into a lawyer than HIPAA. I can’t tell you how often I have heard one of our colleagues threaten, warn, lament or otherwise comment that someone or something violated or violates the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, with the implication that the police are soon to follow and that the hapless violator will soon wind up in irons. Thus, when I got the chance to be a part of a CLE at the Connecticut Bar Association the other day on the issue of just what HIPAA is and how it affects lawyers, I jumped at the chance.
The panel (save me) was a group of really smart and experienced lawyers who know HIPAA and did a great job educating the rest of us. Susan Huntington, deputy general counsel at Hartford Hospital, joined Arnold Menchel, formerly of the Attorney General’s Office and now of Halloran & Sage, and Michael Rigg, of O’Brien, Tanski & Young. Each brought a different focus to this interesting topic.
