What It Is

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 is a U.S. federal regulation establishing national standards for privacy and security of protected health information (PHI). It includes Privacy Rule, Security Rule, and Breach Notification Rule, applying a flexible, risk-based approach to covered entities (providers, plans, clearinghouses) and business associates.

Key Components

• Seven pillars: scope/applicability, PHI privacy controls, ePHI security safeguards (administrative, physical, technical), breach notification, patient rights, BA governance, OCR enforcement.
• No fixed controls; emphasizes documented risk analysis, minimum necessary, TPO permissions.
• Addressable vs. required specifications for scalability.

Why Organizations Use It

• Legally mandatory for covered entities to avoid OCR penalties.
• Mitigates breach risks, ensures secure data flows, builds patient trust.
• Enables cyber resilience, vendor management, market differentiation via compliance maturity.

Implementation Overview

• Phased: assess (risk analysis), build (policies, training, safeguards), operate (monitoring, incidents), assure (audits).
• Applies nationwide to healthcare organizations of all sizes; no certification but requires 6-year documentation retention and OCR readiness.

What It Is

TOGAF® Standard (The Open Group Architecture Framework) is a vendor-neutral enterprise architecture framework and methodology. Its primary purpose is to enable organizations to design, plan, implement, and govern enterprise-wide change across business and IT domains using a structured, iterative approach via the Architecture Development Method (ADM).

Key Components

• Core pillars include ADM (10 phases including Preliminary, Vision, Business/Data/Application/Technology Architectures, Migration, Governance, Change Management), Content Framework (deliverables, artifacts, building blocks), Enterprise Continuum (asset reuse), reference models (TRM, III-RM), and Architecture Capability Framework (governance, skills, maturity).
• Built on principles of iteration, tailoring, and traceability; no fixed controls but metamodel for core entities.
• Certification via Open Group paths for practitioners.

Why Organizations Use It

Drives business-IT alignment, reduces duplication, accelerates delivery via reuse, manages risks, ensures compliance. Offers ROI through efficiency, avoids vendor lock-in, builds stakeholder trust in complex transformations.

Implementation Overview

Phased, iterative rollout: maturity assessment, pilot ADM cycles, scale governance. Suits large enterprises across industries; requires tailoring, training, repository setup. No mandatory audits but voluntary certification.