By Danika Brinda In September of 2019, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) of the Department of Health and Human Services settled the first HIPAA Fine and Corrective Action Plan for $85,000. Fast forward a little over 2 years to late last year  the OCR assigned five more fines and corrective actions plans for non-compliance with Patient Access, now totaling 25 covered entities with settlements with fines. This is a wake-up call for the entire healthcare industry regardless of specialty that having a defined process in place to respond to a patient’s request for information is a must. HIPAA is very clear in the regulations regarding patient access. The main components of the Patient Access Regulation are that:  Patients have a right to inspect and get a copy of their… . . . read more.