Risk Analysis

Amidst all of the other events in Washington DC in January, a law was passed that amended the HIPAA Regulations. . The amendment requires the department of Health and Human Services to take certain items into account during a HIPAA investigation. The text of the bill reads as follows:

Universal Health Systems was hit with a ransomware attach this week. Their servers began to fail over the weekend and Hospitals across the country completely lost access to their EHR systems. As a result of this attack many facilities were forced to go to pen and paper for medical record keeping. In many locations the nursing staff did not have access to medication lists and had no way ok knowing which medications patients needed, how much to dose, or even who needed medications.