Making Sense of Compliance in Health Tech

Executive Summary

In public sector health tech, the challenge isn’t just security or compliance—it’s understanding the architectural intersections that trigger overlapping frameworks like FedRAMP, HIPAA, and FCC.

These frameworks aren’t siloed, and they don’t apply based solely on sector identity. They’re contextual overlays—activated by how your product moves data, who owns it, where it’s deployed, and what systems it touches.

Compliance is not a checklist. It’s a map. And misreading that map slows growth, stalls deals, and burns resources on the wrong readiness path.

Public Sector Health Tech: One Mission, Many Overlays

Products operating in or around public sector health environments may straddle multiple regulatory layers—each dependent on architecture, ownership, and delivery design, not just function.

Compliance isn’t a checklist—it’s context. Public sector health tech requires layered security and regulatory alignment shaped by architecture, data flows, and delivery design.

• A cloud-native diagnostics platform integrated into a VA system may fall under FedRAMP Moderate + HIPAA BAA.

• A mobile app supporting patient consent outside of federal systems may instead trigger FCC privacy controls—especially if delivered through a third-party partner.

• Some products may activate no formal framework—but require clear data handling governance for partner trust and legal defensibility.

These aren’t edge cases. They’re common intersections. And they're shaped less by what your product is—and more by how and where it operates.

The Cost of Misalignment

Too often, teams overcommit to frameworks they don’t need—or underprepare for the ones they do.

• Chasing FedRAMP prematurely can sink resources and delay traction

• Assuming HIPAA suffices can create blind spots in platform security

• Over-indexing on sector identity (e.g. “we’re health tech”) can mask delivery decisions that shift accountability entirely

The result? Wasted spend, lost time, and broken momentum.The real risk isn’t noncompliance—it’s strategic misalignment.

Architecture Drives Accountability

What frameworks apply isn’t just a legal question—it’s an architectural one.

Understanding what’s triggered requires clarity around:

• Where data lives and flows

• Who owns the infrastructure and risk boundaries

• What third-party environments are in play

• How integration, delivery, and support are structured

This is less about knowing the rules—and more about understanding which systems you’re actually operating inside.

The PSF Perspective

At PSF, we don’t offer compliance checklists. We help product leaders map how their architecture activates regulatory expectations across the health tech and public sector landscape.

We’re not a security firm. We’re a clarity partner.

Our role is to help teams avoid false starts, overbuilds, and missed assumptions by aligning product architecture with where public sector opportunity—and obligation—actually lives.

We don’t tell you what certifications you need.

We help you see why they may (or may not) apply.

And we help you build the case for what’s next.