It is clear that the HIPAA legislation regarding patient privacy is attempting to deal with a real problem. However, it is equally clear that the costs of health care are spiraling out of control, and we now have over 45 million Americans without health care insurance.

According to the American Hospital Association, hospitals nationwide expect to spend between $4 billion and $22 billion to comply with the legislation. U.S. Representative Michael Burgess, whose background includes practice as an obstetrician/gynecologist, has argued that implementation should be delayed, saying, “HIPAA is just one more thing layered on that is not delivering one dollar of value to patient care and not increasing our revenue stream at all. This is just money going out of the practice. In effect, it’s an overhead increase.”²²

Prepare a cost-benefit (pro-con) list for each side of the issue.