What is not considered protected health information (PHI) under HIPAA?

When considering what constitutes protected health information (PHI) under HIPAA, it's important to understand that PHI refers to any data that can be used to identify a patient and relates to their health status, provision of healthcare, or payment for healthcare.

Publicly available medical articles do not fall under the definition of PHI because they are not specific to an individual patient. Such articles are information disseminated to the public and do not contain identifiable health details that could be linked to a specific person. Therefore, they do not compromise patient privacy and are not classified as sensitive information protected by HIPAA regulations.

In contrast, patient addresses, Social Security numbers, and medical record numbers are all examples of information that are directly linked to individual patients and could potentially lead to their identification. These types of information are subject to strict regulations under HIPAA to ensure patient privacy and confidentiality are maintained.