In Chapter 11, you learned that there are three types of security safeguards: administrative, physical, and technical. Which of these safeguards do you think is the most important? Why do you think this?

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I think they all have their own part in security , so to say one is more important I cant say that , I think its almost like the human body to say one part is more important than the other would be a little harsh they all play their part in safeguarding .

Physical Safeguards: Unauthorized staff should not be able to access PHI.

In the world of paper charts, this meant that you would need to lock doors and keep paper charts in an area that was restricted to authorized personnel.

With computers becoming more common, physical safeguards also apply to workstation access controls and device/disk controls.

In short, only authorized users should be able to access any data from a workstation that has access to PHI. We cover a lot of what that means in our System Access Policies and Facility Access Policies.

Technical Safeguards: These are the mechanisms by which you manage the access and protect patient data.

These safeguards cover areas like encryption, audit logging, intrusion detection/vulnerability scanning, and data integrity.

Administrative Safeguards: are a special subset of the HIPAA Security Rule that focus on internal organization, policies, procedures, and maintenance of security measures that protect patient health information. Workforce and Business Associate management guidelines are included in this subset.