HITRUST Compliance Consulting
Intelligence Driven Cyber Security Operations
HITRUST Compliance Consulting
HITRUST Common Security Framework (CSF) was collaboratively developed by healthcare and information security professionals to provide a prescriptive framework simplifying the understanding of security standards. It is widely adopted in the US healthcare sector as a key security mechanism. HITRUST offers both a readiness assessment and a CSF-validated assessment, with the latter being the only one that produces a validated certification report, conducted by a HITRUST Approved External Assessor. Our experienced healthcare audit services team will guide you through the HITRUST CSF assessment process.
For healthcare organizations, safeguarding patient and sensitive healthcare information is of utmost importance, necessitating compliance with a multitude of regulations. Keeping up with the ever-expanding array of relevant standards can be challenging for stakeholders across various healthcare service organizations, associates, and vendors.
To address these challenges, the Health Information Trust Alliance (HITRUST) offers a comprehensive, risk-based certifiable framework. This framework assists healthcare service providers of all sizes and complexity in integrating compliance with an extensive range of regulations, standards, and best practice.
While HIPAA provides defined penalties for data security breaches, HITRUST enforcement is largely driven and managed by the healthcare industry. The industry has seen swift adoption of HITRUST, and through hospitals and payers requiring certification, it is gaining ground as an expectation for service providers and vendors.
HITRUST certification is not always required during the adoption of new technology, however, it provides opportunities to streamline security and compliance as part of the implementation process.
HITRUST introduced and maintains the Common Security Framework (CSF) that provides a process to standardize Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliance and coordinate it with other national and international data security frameworks and many state laws.
By integrating more than 20 different requirements and processes the HITRUST CSF Certification allows healthcare organizations to perform a single assessment to certify compliance with multiple initiatives (including a HIPAA compliance audit).
Risk Advisory
Our approach to HITRUST Compliance Consulting
Scope Formulation
An efficient healthcare IT audit begins with a scoping process that considers regulatory needs, current IT assets, and risk factors in the security environment. For a HITRUST assessment, determining compliance needs, understanding the current architecture, and assessing the risk environment is crucial. If HIPAA applies, compliance with the Privacy Rule, Security Rule, and Breach Notification Rule is necessary. HITRUST goes beyond HIPAA, making it a better target for comprehensive healthcare security.
Perform Readiness
Before pursuing HITRUST CSF certification, organizations must conduct a preliminary audit using the MyCSF tool or with an advisor’s assistance. The assessment evaluates control implementation against five Maturity Levels: Policy, Procedure, Implemented, Measured, and Managed. Policy, Procedure, and Implemented levels carry higher weights (75%), while Measured and Managed levels hold 10% and 15%, respectively. HITRUST self-assessments are preparatory; Validated Assessments from certification partners are essential for official certification and trust assurance.
Implement All Required Architecture
Optimize Ongoing Security Maintenance
Execute a HITRUST Validated Assessment
To successfully complete healthcare auditing, select the appropriate HITRUST assessment, find a vendor to conduct the audit, and proceed with the assessment. While a self-assessment might meet short-term needs, a Validated Assessment is essential for full CSF certification and gaining a competitive advantage with business partners.
There are two types of Validated Assessments available:
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HITRUST i1 Validated Assessments: Straightforward audits with just over 200 Specifications and one Maturity Level, granting certification for one year.
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HITRUST r2 Validated Assessments: More complex audits with up to 2000 Specifications across all Maturity Levels, granting certification for two years. The r2 model provides higher trust assurance and optimized security ROI.
How do I get
Certcube Labs recommends adopting the HITRUST Approach for managing IT security risks and maintaining HITRUST compliance. This involves following the HITRUST CSF and integrating other relevant tools and processes to continuously identify threats, implement controls, and assess the implemented program.
We, at Certcube Labs, can guide your organization through the assessment process, help develop a threat monitoring process, and assist in choosing the appropriate assessment and certification option, whether it’s the HITRUST Implemented, 1-year (i1) Assessment or the HITRUST Risk-based, 2-year (r2) Validated Assessment.
Why adopt the HITRUST
HOW TO
HITRUST CSF provides three options or Degrees of Assurances, which are largely levels of CSF assessment. Below are the Degrees of Assurance first describing the level with the lowest cost, rigor, time, and effort:
Self Assessment
This is an assessment completed by an organization itself without external support to verify the assessment. HITRUST issues a CSF Self-Assessment Report that achieves a low-level non-certified accreditation. The self-assessment is also an excellent method to use periodically to assess and verify an organization’s data security posture. Gaps identified during the assessment can be addressed and any required system changes implemented before considering a third-party validated assessment.
CSF Validated
This level requires that a HITRUST approved third-party CSF assessor verify the evidence provided by the organization completing the assessment. The CSF Assessor will conduct an onsite visit as required for this Degree of Assurance. HITRUST reviews the completed, assessor-verified assessment and issues a Validated Report.
CSF Certified
This level is similar to the validated assessment with the main difference that the organization meets all of the in-scope CSF-specific controls to be granted a HITRUST CSF Certification. The certified level builds on the CSF Validated assessment as HITRUST reviews, scores, and certifies the evidence provided by the organization and validated by the third-party assessor and issues a Certified Report.