This is fine so long as your conversation with a patient doesn’t contain PHI but if a patient text conversations turns clinical or contains PHI, you’ll want a secure channel to switch over to and utilize. While HHS considers text appointment reminders to be HIPAA-compliant, a 1-to-1 ongoing patient conversation over traditional SMS or text messaging is not HIPAA-compliant.
#Hipaa text messaging program how to
The COVID-19 pandemic only heightened the need for HIPAA-compliant and two-way patient messaging options as both providers and patients became more aware of the need to limit face-to-face contact with others and medical office staff began fielding rapid-fire questions from patients who had new questions about how to navigate healthcare in a pandemic. There are many applications for these strategies and reasons why medical practices who don’t adopt some form of patient messaging will struggle to keep up with the changing market dynamics and patient expectations. This is where HIPAA-compliant and chat software is so important to medical practices who want to engage their patients effectively. Patients don’t always behave within the confines we define for them, so medical offices need strategies that empower them to respond to patients accordingly. What happens when in place of responding, “1 to confirm, 2 to reschedule, or 3 to cancel”, a patient responds to a text reminder with a thumbs-up emoji or a question like, “yes, but where should I park?”
But it’s time to take it further with HIPAA-compliant messaging and chat because patients do the majority of their communicating via text message and they don’t always choose pre-programmed responses to automated solutions. Medical practices have made major strides towards patient-centered strategies, swapping manual and paper-based processes for digital options, like automated appointment reminders and digital patient check-in.
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