[Med-privacy] sharing

[Peter Marshall]

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Privacy and Security Law Blog: Health Privacy Compromised, But When Is 
It Okay To Share?

While not involving computer hackers, here's a story about an 
old-fashioned invasion of privacy. The Kansas City Star reported on 
September 28th that a University of Missouri hospital faces a 
class-action lawsuit after allegedly releasing confidential medical 
records for hundreds of patients to a company it hired to solicit 
business. The suit was filed earlier this year on behalf of 
approximately 800 patients with liver diseases, including hepatitis C. 
The complaint alleges that records were turned over by University 
Hospital's internal medicine chairman to a home health care provider 
dba Option Care, who then allegedly called the patients in an effort to 
sell them antiviral drugs and keep them in the hospital network. The 
Option Care nurse who contacted the patients using the list from the 
hospital stated that the calls were not for solicitation, but for 
patient safety.

This complaint, whether valid or not, highlights the major privacy 
concerns surrounding access to patients' medical records. The privacy 
discussion reached a fever pitch in the build-up to the passage of the 
federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, more 
(un)popularly known as "HIPAA." HIPAA has been touted as a major step 
in affording patients their proper privacy protections, as the law and 
regulations outline the parameters and limitations in which providers 
and businesses can access, share, and transfer certain protected health 
information of individuals as well as security requirements. In fact, 
one of the highlighted concerns leading up to HIPAA was access to 
patient medical records by private companies for business solicitation 
purposes.


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<bold><fontfamily><param>Copperplate</param><color><param>FFFF,4444,0000</param><smaller>Privacy
and Security Law Blog: Health Privacy Compromised, But When Is It Okay
To Share?</smaller></color><smaller>


</smaller></fontfamily></bold><fontfamily><param>Lucida Grande</param><smaller><x-tad-smaller>While
not involving computer hackers, here's a story about an old-fashioned
invasion of privacy. The Kansas City Star
</x-tad-smaller><color><param>5555,5555,5555</param><x-tad-smaller>reported</x-tad-smaller></color><x-tad-smaller>
on September 28th that a University of Missouri hospital faces a
class-action lawsuit after allegedly releasing confidential medical
records for hundreds of patients to a company it hired to solicit
business. The suit was filed earlier this year on behalf of
approximately 800 patients with liver diseases, including hepatitis C.
The complaint alleges that records were turned over by University
Hospital's internal medicine chairman to a home health care provider
dba Option Care, who then allegedly called the patients in an effort
to sell them antiviral drugs and keep them in the hospital network.
The Option Care nurse who contacted the patients using the list from
the hospital stated that the calls were not for solicitation, but for
patient safety.


This complaint, whether valid or not, highlights the major privacy
concerns surrounding access to patients' medical records. The privacy
discussion reached a fever pitch in the build-up to the passage of the
federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, more
(un)popularly known as "HIPAA." HIPAA has been touted as a major step
in affording patients their proper privacy protections, as the law and
regulations outline the parameters and limitations in which providers
and businesses can access, share, and transfer certain protected
health information of individuals as well as security requirements. In
fact, one of the highlighted concerns leading up to HIPAA was access
to patient medical records by private companies for business
solicitation purposes.


</x-tad-smaller></smaller></fontfamily>
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  Privacy Digest 9/29/05 
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