Actually, no. The final measures took effect on that day. As a patient, you should be more worried about the resources your health care providers are diverting to comply with HIPAA than any disclosures of information. As a matter of law, medical records and histories can only be disclosed without authorization to government agencies if a subpoena is presented. Same as it ever was.
Much of your health information will be distributed to agencies and companies for research and statistical reasons, but that information must not contain any personal identification data. This is not new, or unusual. There is a national tumor registry that keeps track of data on every cancer patient in the country. You could scour their files for years and never determine who had the disease. What HIPAA will do, however, is slow the time it takes you to get referrals, prescriptions, second opinions, and all sorts of routine matters associated with your health. You need to sign a release every time your personal info with identifying data is given to someone other than the primary holder of the information. It's costing millions in compliance. But it's not the end of the world as patients know it.
Thank you. As a programmer/analyst with about 10 to 12 years in the health-care arena, you have correctly summarized some of the effects of HIPAA. The tendency of some (normally educated and prudent) Freepers to go out of control upon reading a few lines out of a legislative bill is alarming, on occasion.