HIPAA
HR in PA
59 Posts
I came across this article today and thought that you might enjoy it.
(Posted on Wed, Apr. 23, 2003 on philly.com, written by Ronnie Polaneczky )
Patient-privacy law mandates some silliness
EARLY LAST Monday morning, Patti Starner's mom had a heart attack.
Just hours after a new federal law meant to protect patients' privacy kicked in.
You might have noticed this law if you've recently had to fill out forms about your medical records for everyone from your dentist to your podiatrist. But Starner had to deal with an entirely different kind of fallout.
Monday, Starner sped from her Old City home to her mom's bedside in a Reading hospital, where she spent the day discussing her elderly mother's condition with a staff nurse in the intensive-care unit. Blood pressure, lab tests, medical history - you name it, they talked about it.
The next morning, she returned to the ICU and asked how her mother had fared through the night.
"I can't discuss that with you," the same nurse told her. "It's private information."
Apparently, the nurses had just caught up to the new law.
A few days later, Starner's mom had recovered enough to be moved out of the ICU.
But nurses wouldn't tell the family where she went.
"My sister-in-law asked, 'Where's mom?' They said, 'We can't say. But she won't be coming back here,' " said Starner.
"I thought, what's this - a new euphemism for 'the morgue?'"
Blame the nonsense on HIPAA - the silly-sounding acronym for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. It includes all kinds of mandates about where, how, when, why and to whom patient information can be released.
Generally speaking, this is a good thing. Go to the Web site for Georgetown University's Health Privacy Project, which spearheaded the attachment of the regulations to HIPAA, and you can see why. Anecdotes abound of icky personal health information being used against unsuspecting citizens who assumed their medical lives were private.
Like the exemplary North Carolina employee who was fired after her self-insured company learned she had a rare genetic disorder that was going to drive up their medical costs.
Or the 4,000 Tampa patients whose positive HIV status was sent to two newspapers by a public-health worker who'd had access to their medical files.
Or poor country crooner Tammy Wynette, whose medical records were sold for $2,610 to the National Enquirer by an employee at the hospital where Wynette was treated.
Now there's a country song for you: "Yew Broke My Heart When Yew Sold My EKG."
The new regulations do more than condemn this bad behavior. They also demand fines or prison time for the some offenses.
Which is making nervous nellies of medical folk, said attorney Melinda Hatton, a VP for the American Hospital Association.
Even if private information is disclosed unintentionally to someone who shouldn't be privy to it, she said - like a family member or outside agency, "Hospitals will worry that even the smallest fine will give the impression they're not concerned about protecting privacy."
Private medical and dental offices and any other facility that bills third-party payers are also affected by the new regs. Which means you'll be seeing some nit-picky behavior the next time you get a physical or a tooth filled.
Medical charts might be placed face down outside your exam room, so patients can't read your name when they walk by.
Computer screens could be shielded from view when you sign in at the dentist, so you won't see that Ms. Polaneczky had her back molar capped.
You may be asked to produce a driver's license as proof of identity when you retrieve your prescription from the pharmacy.
Even if it's a pharmacy you've often used in the past.
And forms - you want forms? Expect to keep signing them in triplicate wherever you use your insurance card, so everyone knows you've been told what your privacy rights are.
As for finding out what your mother's medical condition is, well, better make sure she's aware enough to sign a form saying you have the right to ask.
Or just wait for sanity to prevail, the way Patti Starner did.
"Once my mother was transferred out of the ICU, the nurses on the new floor were much more relaxed, though still respectful of her privacy," she said."
By then, of course, a week had passed. Maybe the hospital had finally figured out that there's a line between privacy and absurdity.
And that it's not as fine as they'd thought.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Posted on Wed, Apr. 23, 2003 on philly.com, written by Ronnie Polaneczky )
Patient-privacy law mandates some silliness
EARLY LAST Monday morning, Patti Starner's mom had a heart attack.
Just hours after a new federal law meant to protect patients' privacy kicked in.
You might have noticed this law if you've recently had to fill out forms about your medical records for everyone from your dentist to your podiatrist. But Starner had to deal with an entirely different kind of fallout.
Monday, Starner sped from her Old City home to her mom's bedside in a Reading hospital, where she spent the day discussing her elderly mother's condition with a staff nurse in the intensive-care unit. Blood pressure, lab tests, medical history - you name it, they talked about it.
The next morning, she returned to the ICU and asked how her mother had fared through the night.
"I can't discuss that with you," the same nurse told her. "It's private information."
Apparently, the nurses had just caught up to the new law.
A few days later, Starner's mom had recovered enough to be moved out of the ICU.
But nurses wouldn't tell the family where she went.
"My sister-in-law asked, 'Where's mom?' They said, 'We can't say. But she won't be coming back here,' " said Starner.
"I thought, what's this - a new euphemism for 'the morgue?'"
Blame the nonsense on HIPAA - the silly-sounding acronym for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. It includes all kinds of mandates about where, how, when, why and to whom patient information can be released.
Generally speaking, this is a good thing. Go to the Web site for Georgetown University's Health Privacy Project, which spearheaded the attachment of the regulations to HIPAA, and you can see why. Anecdotes abound of icky personal health information being used against unsuspecting citizens who assumed their medical lives were private.
Like the exemplary North Carolina employee who was fired after her self-insured company learned she had a rare genetic disorder that was going to drive up their medical costs.
Or the 4,000 Tampa patients whose positive HIV status was sent to two newspapers by a public-health worker who'd had access to their medical files.
Or poor country crooner Tammy Wynette, whose medical records were sold for $2,610 to the National Enquirer by an employee at the hospital where Wynette was treated.
Now there's a country song for you: "Yew Broke My Heart When Yew Sold My EKG."
The new regulations do more than condemn this bad behavior. They also demand fines or prison time for the some offenses.
Which is making nervous nellies of medical folk, said attorney Melinda Hatton, a VP for the American Hospital Association.
Even if private information is disclosed unintentionally to someone who shouldn't be privy to it, she said - like a family member or outside agency, "Hospitals will worry that even the smallest fine will give the impression they're not concerned about protecting privacy."
Private medical and dental offices and any other facility that bills third-party payers are also affected by the new regs. Which means you'll be seeing some nit-picky behavior the next time you get a physical or a tooth filled.
Medical charts might be placed face down outside your exam room, so patients can't read your name when they walk by.
Computer screens could be shielded from view when you sign in at the dentist, so you won't see that Ms. Polaneczky had her back molar capped.
You may be asked to produce a driver's license as proof of identity when you retrieve your prescription from the pharmacy.
Even if it's a pharmacy you've often used in the past.
And forms - you want forms? Expect to keep signing them in triplicate wherever you use your insurance card, so everyone knows you've been told what your privacy rights are.
As for finding out what your mother's medical condition is, well, better make sure she's aware enough to sign a form saying you have the right to ask.
Or just wait for sanity to prevail, the way Patti Starner did.
"Once my mother was transferred out of the ICU, the nurses on the new floor were much more relaxed, though still respectful of her privacy," she said."
By then, of course, a week had passed. Maybe the hospital had finally figured out that there's a line between privacy and absurdity.
And that it's not as fine as they'd thought.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
