1. Locate an interesting article about a HIPAA violation in which a healthcare professional breached patient confidentiality. According to New York Times Article “New York –Presbyterian Hospital has agreed to pay a $2.2 million penalty to federal regulators for allowing television crews to film two patients without their consent- one which was dying, the other in significant distress. Regulators said on Thursday that the hospital allowed filming to continue even after a medical professional asked that it stop.” (Ornstein, 2016)
a. Explain how HIPAA was violated
They filmed patents without their consent, which violate patient right of privacy.
b. How the violation impacted the patient; and patients were on social media without knowing it.
How
The purpose of the HIPAA transactions and code set standards is to simplify the processes and decrease the costs associated with payment for health care services. The transactions and code set standards apply to patient-identifiable health information transmitted electronically. Physician practices will continue to be able to submit paper claims. When the regulations take effect in October 2002, standard formats and code sets will take the place of any payer-specific or location-specific formats or requirements. ICD-9-CM Volume 1 and 2: Diagnosis Coding - ICD-9-CM is used to code and classify morbidity data from the inpatient and outpatient records, physician offices, and most National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) surveys.
This describes the issue of violation of privacy to access personal information from medical records. The professional health workers took Henrietta’s cells from her cervical area, utilizing her body for the sake of science. It was violation and a crime. Because of these issues, it has raised the concern about hospital administrators following privacy protocol to this day. This should not have been done by medical staff, especially professionals to keep her information confidential, with no public access to her records.
I agree with you, Dr. Zhou should have clear understanding of the HIPAA law, that is part of orientation practice for everyone who has access to patient information in the health care field. For Dr. Zhou to access the patient electronic records after his termination is very alarming. Everyone agrees that his plea deal of $2000 of fine and four months in prison was a lesser punishment than what he deserves. According the HIPAA law he could spent more than 10 years in prison for his action .What is your thoughts. Don’t you think UCLA should have been liable for failing to protect the patient information.
Since HIPAA become mandatory on most of the health care organization, patient information is more secure compared to previous. Health care organization are investing huge amount of fund for safety measures to protect the patient information and i think this is the main concern in today's advanced health care
Medical facilities improved responsibility when it came to their client’s medical history. It caused hospitals to push their faculty to learn a more secure policy that made the patients feel at ease about give his or her personal background. The act provided the patients with the ability to control what is allowed or not such as who can know his or her appointment information. HIPAA lets people have access to medical history without going through unnecessary loops.
When it comes to a patient that does not speak English the first thing we have to do is find someone capable and a professional to translate, complying with all the HIPAA regulations are being taken care of and not violated. Whether it is a live person, over the phone service or if available online. We cannot ask a family member to serve as a translator because we might break the patient confidentiality if the patient does not want anybody knowing his diagnosis and the procedures being done to them. With a deaf patient first we have to find out what is the best way to communicate with the patient if by reading lips always face them forward so they can read our lips, speaking clearly so they can understand a little better what we are trying
HIPPA Breaches A Common Legal Issue in Healthcare When it pertains to patient health information discretion is paramount. Protecting patients from threats that could endanger their rights is essential and the primary reason for safeguarding their personal information is to secure the interest of the individuals who are entrusting the organization with their information. There are however breaches to individuals’ private health information. In the healthcare field one common legal issue is HIPPA and data breaches.
The ethical principles and theory above are examples of why the HIPAA regulations need to be amended to address the use of genetic information. If HIPAA regulations include the release of genetic information, the uniformed sister can be aware of her possible genetic mutation. However, with the current HIPAA policy Mrs. Smith’s genetic information can only be released with her consent. HIPAA 's current policy does not seem fair regarding the uninformed sister’s circumstances. Nurses and doctors are expected to care for their patients to the best of their ability, but with the current HIPAA policies their duties are
All healthcare professionals, whether it is the receptionists all the way up to the owner of the hospital, are going to have heard about HIPAA at some point in their employment. The punishment is pretty hefty, so that is probably why there are only a couple of cases with violations of HIPAA resulting in criminal severities. The legalities of breaching PHI “to a third party carries a jail term of up to 10 years in addition to a maximum fine of $500,000 if the disclosure is made
If you work in healthcare, anywhere from a small medical office to a big hospital to an insurance company, you need to be in compliance with HIPAA. This is a long, complicated document and even big insurance companies struggle to keep the rules fresh in everyone 's mind and everyone on top of the most critical functions. Here are a few things to make sure you are doing right: 1) Make sure Protected Health Information (PHI) is not casually observable. This means turning papers face down on your desk, not leaving charts visible on office doors, and making sure your computer screen cannot be readily seen by other people. This includes not only patients but other staff.
(September 30, 2013) - The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published amended rules applicable to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 in January 2013. As explained by the Secretary of HHS, healthcare has experienced significant changes since HIPAA was enacted in 1996. The implementation of electronic medical records is just one of those changes. The new HIPAA regulations are designed to provide patients with better privacy protection, and additional rights not included in the original HIPAA rules.
Nurses and doctors take the oath to protect the privacy and the confidentiality of patients. Patients and their medical conditions should not be discussed with anyone who is not treating the patient. Electronic health records are held to the same standards as nurses in that information is to be kept between, and shared only with the immediate care team. HIPAA violations are not taken lightly nor are the violation fines cheap. Depending on the violation, a hospital can be fined from $100 to $50,000 per violation (National Nurse 2011 p 23).
As a patient you know the rules but as a Medical Assistant or anything related to the medical field you should be more than experienced with what you can or cannot do related to the patient rights, privacy and obviously HIPPA rules. “The HIPAA Privacy Rule establishes national standards to protect individuals’ medical records and other personal health information and applies to health plans, health care clearinghouses, and those health care
Unfortunately HIPAA violations happen every year in our country. In fact, a situation happened in a New York-Presbyterian Hospital and Columbia University Medical Center on May 7th 2010. The HIPAA violation happened after the electronic health records of 6,800 patients ended up on Google for the world to see. The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) who are responsible for HIPAA enforcement laws deeply investigated this case. It was discovered that a Columbia University physician who developed applications for New York-Presbyterian Hospital and Columbia University, attempted to deactivate a personally owned computer server on the network containing electronic protected health information (ePHI).
As records were shared electronically rules were implemented for clinicians to follow known as The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 (Summary of the HIPAA Security Rule ,2013). These rules were implemented for clinicians to protect the