How to Get HIPAA-Compliant Web Forms

If your website has any form that could collect, transmit, or store health information tied to a person, assume it must be HIPAA compliant. Inadequate protections open you to legal, reputational, and financial risk.

This guide explains what “HIPAA-compliant” really entails, common failure points, and how you can adopt a solution that ensures compliance without compromise.

Why you must treat every form as potentially regulated

• Free-text fields are a liability. Even a generic “message” box can be used by a patient to disclose symptoms, diagnoses, or treatments. Once you receive health details tied to an identifiable individual, that content is PHI and triggers HIPAA obligations.

• HIPAA does not provide a “safe” threshold for occasional PHI collection via non-medical forms. The moment PHI is processed, the rules apply.

• Any system that creates, receives, maintains, or transmits electronic PHI (ePHI) is in scope of the HIPAA Security Rule.

• “Contact” or “feedback” forms in a healthcare context are commonly cited as requiring compliance when used by patients to disclose health issues.

Design all your web forms under HIPAA standards or segregate them so no PHI ever flows through a non-compliant form.

What counts as PHI in a web form

• Health-related details (symptoms, diagnoses, treatments, medical history) tied to an individual

• Identifiers (name, email, address, DOB, phone, etc.) tied to health data

• File uploads of medical records, images, lab reports

• Billing or payment information in a medical context

If any field or user upload could cross that threshold, treat the form as regulated.

Core safeguards you must implement

• Encryption in transit and at rest

• Strict access control & authentication

• Audit logging & monitoring

• Business Associate Agreement (BAA) with every vendor

• Secure file upload handling (compliant storage vendors, isolated and access restricted storage)

• Retention & deletion policies

• Risk analysis & periodic security audits

• Incident response / breach plan

Any gap is a compliance failure.

Secure form architecture and workflow

1. Serve form over HTTPS

2. Submit via secure endpoint

3. Server verifies, decrypts, sanitizes

4. Store in encrypted, access-controlled database

5. Role & audit controls

6. Secure backups, retention, deletion

7. Continuous logging & monitoring

Every hop must maintain security and traceability.

Why DIY is high risk

• Overlooked third parties (hosting, scripts, analytics)

• Misconfiguration (e.g. open cloud buckets, unencrypted backups)

• Human error (permissions, weak passwords)

• Evolving compliance requirements

• Maintenance, monitoring, audits, training

You can’t build compliance once and forget it.

How to evaluate a HIPAA-ready form vendor

A vendor must provide:

• End-to-end encryption

• Role-based access & audit logs

• Secure file upload

• A BAA with your organization

• Embeddable forms / APIs that don’t leak PHI

• Data deletion / retention controls

• Transparent security practices and compliance focus

In addition to "checking the boxes" above, we recommend inspecting the tools, dashboards, and data provided by the vendor. Before moving forward with a solution, you should have a solid understanding of how PHI is handled by them.

Form Vessel: Built for compliance

When dealing with sensitive patient data, you don’t want piecemeal fixes. You need a form system engineered for compliance from the ground up. Form Vessel was designed specifically for this HIPAA compliance.

What sets Form Vessel apart:

• Compliance at the core: Encryption, access controls, audit trails, and secure upload handling are built in, not added as optional extras.

• Full BAA coverage: Form Vessel provides a Business Associate Agreement that ensures alignment with HIPAA obligations.

• Control with flexibility: You define the fields and design while compliance protections stay enforced automatically.

• Operational assurance: Security, audits, and monitoring are managed by Form Vessel, which can eliminate burden on your internal team for web forms.

• Future-proofed security: As regulations evolve, Form Vessel updates its infrastructure so your forms remain compliant over time without you having to lift a finger.

With Form Vessel, you gain peace of mind that your forms are not just “good enough” but fully aligned with the strictest standards.

What should you do next?

1. Review your current forms

2. Remove or replace any that are not HIPAA-Compliant

3. Choose a HIPAA-Compliant solution like Form Vessel or implement your own

4. Keep an eye on who can access PHI you collect and update access controls regularly