Here’s a solid HIPAA Compliance Website Checklist tailored for hospitals, clinics, and private practices, tailored to orthopedics, neurosurgery, ENT, dermatology, family medicine, medical weight loss, and integrative medicine healthcare organizations.

🧠 Core Concepts

HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) applies whenever a website collects, stores, transmits, or processes Protected Health Information (PHI). Anything that can identify a patient and relates to health, treatment, or payment.

So even if your site isn’t running a full EHR (Electronic Health Record), things like contact forms, chat tools, appointment requests, and analytics tracking can trigger HIPAA obligations.

✅ HIPAA Website Compliance Checklist

1. Data Collection & Transmission

• Use HTTPS with a valid SSL certificate (TLS 1.2+) on your medical website.

• Encrypt all form submissions that include PHI (SSL in transit + encryption at rest).

• Ensure email notifications with PHI are either encrypted or replaced by secure portal alerts.

• Avoid standard contact forms (use HIPAA-compliant forms like High Level HIPAA Forms, PulseMD, Agency Atlas, or FormDr).

• Disable form auto-fill or caching of PHI in browsers

2. Hosting & Infrastructure

• Host on a HIPAA-compliant server (e.g., AWS with BAA, Atlantic.Net, or Google Cloud Healthcare).

• Maintain a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) with the host.

• Ensure daily encrypted backups of the database.

• Use secure SFTP or equivalent protocols for file transfers.
   

3. Third-Party Services

• Only integrate with vendors who sign a BAA — this includes:

  • Email services (e.g., Paubox, Google Workspace with BAA)

  • CRMs or marketing platforms (e.g., Salesforce Health Cloud, HubSpot Enterprise with BAA)

  • Telehealth tools or chatbots.
     

• Avoid using tracking scripts (Google Analytics, Meta Pixel, Hotjar, etc.) on pages where PHI is collected.

• Use a HIPAA-compliant analytics platform (e.g., Matomo on a private server, or Google Analytics 4 configured to avoid PHI collection).
   

4. Access Control & Security

• Restrict access to PHI with role-based permissions.

• Implement 2FA (two-factor authentication) for admin logins.

• Enforce password complexity & expiration policies.

• Maintain an audit trail of all access and changes.
   

5. Content, Cookies & Tracking

• Include a HIPAA-compliant Privacy Policy detailing PHI handling.

• Include a Notice of Privacy Practices (NPP) accessible on the site.

• Use a cookie consent manager configured to block trackers until consent is given.

• Do not store IP addresses, referrers, or session data linked to PHI.
   

6. Patient Communication

• Use secure messaging portals instead of email for patient inquiries.

• Do not publish testimonials containing PHI without written patient consent.

• Do not use live chat tools unless they’re HIPAA-compliant (e.g., Compliancy Group, MedChat, or LiveChat with BAA).

• For appointment scheduling, use tools with BAAs (e.g., SimplePractice, NexHealth, or IntakeQ).
   

7. Maintenance & Training

• Conduct annual HIPAA risk assessments.

• Document all BAAs and security policies.

• Provide staff HIPAA training for handling website inquiries.

• Maintain a breach response plan.
   

8. Marketing & Remarketing

• No retargeting ads based on health service page visits.

• Only use anonymized data for campaign performance.

• Do not share PHI with ad platforms (Google, Facebook, etc.).

• Avoid embedding social media widgets that track user behavior on pages handling PHI.
   

⚙️ Optional: HIPAA-Safe Stack Agency Tools

Hosting: DNN4Less.com or AWS (BAA)
Forms: High Level HIPAA Compliant Forms
Email: Google Workspace BAA
Analytics: Matomo on private server
AI: Custom Trained, Closed Source Large Language Model on Private Intranet
Chat: MedChat or Compliancy Group’s solution
CMS: DNN, Sanity, WordPress hardened with HIPAA plug-ins and managed BAA host
Agency: HIPAA Compliance trained