Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was adopted in 1996, in order to safeguard Protected Health Information (PHI). HIPAA guidelines imposed by the US government transformed managing and protecting the data in the healthcare industry. Its mandatory for any healthcare software product entering the US market to abide by this regulation.
Healthcare organizations have to adhere to the strict protocols internally to be HIPPA compliant. Non-compliance can result in severe business loss. To be HIPPA compliant means that companies must protect the Electronic Protected Health Information (ePHI). This needs to be done by endorsing strict, strongest privacy and security controls. Hence, HIPPA compliance testing is mandatory for all healthcare software applications.
At Pro – Test, we have in-depth understanding of HIPPA guidelines for testing healthcare software applications. We include HIPPA compliance verification, as a crucial part of our initial sanity testing and full- feature testing. We provide detailed HIPPA compliance defects report, which helps to fix the errors on priority. Our testing strategy varies depending on the requirements of the software application.
Here is a broad outline of our HIPPA Compliance Testing Strategies:
- Initial Sanity Testing: We assist our clients by conducting an initial sanity testing in the early development cycle. This helps to uncover any major defects early on.
- Developing a Roles Matrix: Working along with our client, we identify roles, components and operations associated with application. Risk identification factors (information disclosure, frequency of use, chance of error, and impact to the customer if an error occurs in a given component.)
- Creating Test Cases: We recognize test scenarios and write a test case for each scenario, which provides better traceability.
We focus on these 5 main areas to conduct HIPPA Compliance Testing:
- User Authentication : According to the HIPPA guidelines, a user should be allowed access to a minimum amount of information required to complete a task. While conducting user authentication testing, we check for the successful login path. We also test the negative path such as login failure, locked-out account, login idle timeout and many more.
- Information Disclosure : There are two main strategies :
- Role Based Access (RBA) : In this , we group users into classes based on their level of access they are granted, while using a specific component.
- Patient Allocation (PA): A supervisor assigns patients to a health care provider for a specified period of time.
We design test cases to make sure that PA limitations are respected. So that application users are able to edit patient information, only for which they are supposed to have access. Our test strategy also ensures that, once the work is completed if the application is uninstalled. Along with ensuring that, all the EPHI has been completely deleted from the device or system.
- Audit Trail: We perform analysis of audit trails for a thorough testing. A comparison study is conducted to validate that entries produced are similar to the expected ones.
- Data transfers : We utilize a network analyser tool to make sure that all the ePHIs are encrypted when:
- Data is accessed between mobile devices using the application and in all workstations
- Data is transferred to an external location
- Movement of data to an offline location
- Information on Correct Data Use: Here, we verify that users are explained how to use the data prior to accessing the data.
At Pro – Test, we specialize in testing healthcare applications and devices. We understand that stakes are very high in healthcare industry. We can assist you in ensuring your healthcare software applications are HIPPA compliant. We can also build a customized HIPPA compliant software as per your requirements.
Connect with our healthcare testing specialists today.
Know more about Pro – Test Independent Testing and Quality Assurance Services.
