The
voice-activated technology helps make appointments, check prescriptions and do
other tasks
Amazon's Alexa, the
voice-activated virtual assistant, now meets federal requirements
under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
to handle personal health information, Amazon recently announced. As a result,
Alexa and similar cloud-based devices that comply with HIPAA can enable
employees to navigate their health insurance coverage and receive personalized
health care services.
Health
care providers, pharmacy benefit managers and digital health coaching companies
operating in Alexa's HIPAA-eligible environment will be able to communicate
with health care users to "help customers manage a variety of health care
needs at home simply using voice—whether it's booking a medical appointment,
accessing hospital post-discharge instructions, checking on the status of a
prescription delivery, and more," Amazon Alexa's head of Alexa Health and
Wellness, Rachel Jiang, announced.
Cigna
is among the insurers using Alexa to communicate with its plan enrollees.
"Customers can simply use voice to understand the full range of their
health benefits and receive personalized wellness incentives for meeting their
health goals, empowering them to take control of their total health,"
said Cigna's senior vice president of global brand and customer
communications, Stephen Cassell, in Amazon's announcement.
PBM
Express Scripts is also on board. "We believe voice technology, like
Alexa, can make it easy for people to stay on the right path by tracking the
status of their mail-order prescription, helping us further solve the costly
and unhealthy problem of medication nonadherence," said Mark Bini, Express
Scripts' vice president of innovation and member experience.
The
American Dental Association (ADA) is interested in Alexa's potential to
promote dental health. "Voice technology could be a big part of what
health care looks like in the future," said Nima Aflatooni, a member of
the ADA's Council on Dental Practice, in ADA News. "We are
interested in seeing if Alexa can really help patients connect to dentists and
get more efficient access to care while securely protecting patient information
in a HIPAA-compliant manner."
An
Employee Health Care Role
Answering
employees' health care questions through a device like Alexa has the potential
to lower health care costs by improving employee education and compliance, said
David Reid, CEO and co-founder of Ease, which provides software for HR and
benefits administration.
"One
of the largest challenges for employee benefits has been quick, convenient
access to relevant information," such as which physicians are in an
employee's health care network, Reid said. While there has been an increase in
tools that make health care information easier to access, such as phone-based
apps for comparing health care providers, with a device such as
Alexa "employees don't have to log in or access the Internet for
information," making it much more likely that they will actually use it.
'Employees
don't have to log in or access the Internet for information.'
Effect
on Health Care Benefits
Employers
are turning to health care technology to recruit and retain top talent, Reid
said. "Millennials, the largest group in today's workforce, are demanding
qualities in their benefit packages that aren't possible without technology,
such as accessibility, mobility and flexibility," he explained.
"The
ability to book a medical appointment or query recent blood sugar results via
Alexa can provide data that will help better design health care offerings for
employees," Reid said. "The more an insurance carrier knows about
employee health service preferences, the better they can work with brokers to
offer employees benefits they use and want."
Slack
Seeks HIPAA Certification
Alexa
isn't the only cloud-based communication tool that sees value in becoming HIPAA-compliant.
Slack, a San Francisco-based business messaging application, is looking to have its messaging app
used by health care providers and has asked to be designated a
HIPAA "business associate," allowed to receive, maintain and transmit
protected health information, the trade publication HealthLeaders reported.
While
consumer advocates have raised concerns about health care companies accessing
protected health information shared in messages and transmitted through
cloud-based services, Slack "reiterates throughout its filing that it
understands the importance of remaining HIPAA-compliant and the consequences of
failure to meet federal regulations," according to HealthLeaders.
Failure to meet HIPAA obligations could result in significant civil monetary
penalties, criminal penalties with fines and even imprisonment.
Amazon,
Slack and other companies whose devices seek to handle personal health
information may be subject to state health information and patient privacy laws
in addition to HIPAA,HealthLeaders noted.
Wellness
Apps Not HIPAA Compliant
Most
health care, fitness tracker and wellness apps are not covered by HIPAA, and
they "can and do readily share health
care and other data collected by the apps with third parties,
including marketing and analytics companies," recently wrote Sara Jodka,
an attorney in the Columbus, Ohio office of Dickinson Wright.
App
users "bear the bulk of responsibility when they choose to input their
personal health or other information into apps," she noted. "Health
information does not have a universal protection and HIPAA is extremely limited
as to its protections to such apps."
Moreover,
"Even if the app is subject to HIPAA, there are a number of ways
information can be disclosed via individual consent–and sometimes via consent
the individual is not even sure they are granting," Jodka warned.
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