Coworker Britch Of Confidentiality

Many healthcare professionals and organizations have not been following the regulations set forth by HIPAA. Whenever violations of HIPAA’s privacy or security laws occur the organizations responsible must be held accountable resulting in a fine or penalty. Penalties provide incentive for organizations to guarantee patient privacy and security. Recently, certain people have failed to follow through with the laws and restrictions and were forced to accept the penalty. This paper will provide three real examples of such HIPAA violations as well as solutions or ways each violation could have been prevented.

This incident was later reported to the Office of Civil rights (OCR) by a patient who was informed by the hospital that his medical records had been lost by an employee and left them on a subway train. The One hundred and ninety two patients involved had been patients of the hospitals Infectious Disease outpatient practice, which includes HIV/AIDS patients. The fact that the patients involved in this case were potentially AIDS patients, made the violation that much more serious. Investigators had to take in to account that these people had their medical records lost, and in those records were their phone numbers and addresses and possibly their place of employment. If these documents fell into the wrong hands, the potential for destroying the patients’ lives was very high. Had a person with malicious intent got ahold of their information, they could have harassed the patient and possibly spread their personal information around, which could have had devastating consequences.

During this research, there has been a collection of data that had been connected to the instances of HIPAA violations within the United States. There are various cases that have been reported through patients and employees where very personal medical information has been exposed unlawfully for personal gain. These cases have not only put a company at reputational risk. But these cases can also place a patient and or healthcare company in a terrible financial stipulation. This thesis will include a series of charts and tables that describe the fluctuation of such cases involving different examples of HIPAA violations. Not only will there be data of these instances but there will be illustrations of how both patients and healthcare employees exemplify HIPAA violations. These cases will be verified from an external and internal evaluation. Suggestive protocol will be demonstrated to guide one along to ensure the possibility of another case of HIPAA violation is prevented. Protocols and examples are being credited by diverse information.

Even though hipaa violations are an important standard in preventing many individuals from causing several breaches of information from getting out, it is important to work on a strategies within several health care organizations that will work with the privacy rules regarding violation laws. “Jill Granger & Laura Cataldo (2013) reports When working in the healthcare setting, it is important to consult with the guidelines established by one's institution and to participate in any training programs to insure that the appropriate steps are being taken to maintain privacy. There are also a variety of additional resources available from the federal government and professional organizations to assist in the training process that may be especially

In order to minimize the risks for potential privacy breaches, the health information management (HIM) director has to understand all facets of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). This should include conducting an audit of their practices. In this scenario, an audit would have been useful to detect the improper access by the employee sooner. HIPAA uses both its privacy and security regulations to “protect consumer’s health information, allow consumers greater access and control to such information, enhance health care, and finally to create a national framework for health care privacy protection” (Amaguin, n.d.). These privacy and security regulations serve as the “only national set of regulations that governs

HIPAA, (Health Insurance and Portability Act of 1996) outlines rules and regulations and the rights of patients to access their healthcare information such as, notifications of privacy practices, copying and viewing medical records, and amendments. This paper explains why confidentiality is important today and discusses recourses patients can use if they believe their privacy has been violated. This paper will also discuss criminal and civil penalties’ that can occur for breaking HIPAA privacy rules.

HIPAA requires nurses and nursing students to keep patients’ medical records confidential at all time. For instance, I used computer to review patient’s diagnosis, I made sure that I signed off the computer after using it. I also made sure that all the information I brought home with me did not include patient’s name and other information that identify patient identity.

In 1996, President Clinton and the US Congress passed/signed the act of HIPPA. HIPPA was enacted to maintain confidentiality of their patient’s information and to protect health insurance coverage for families and workers when they lose or change their job (portability). HIPPA set standards to respect the individual’s rights by exercising such procedures, authorizing and disclosing information. This means that anybody that works at a daily clinical or administrative job should never under any circumstances speak about the patients. If HIPAA violations are violated, this can greatly impact the person working in the medical field. Not only are violations expensive, but the penalties for noncompliance is based on the level of negligence. Criminal

All this information will be relating directly or indirectly to the patient’s past, present or future medical conditions. There are two way covered entities do not need to keep medical information confidential are when the information does not reveal the identity of the patient and the patient authorizes the release of information through a written HIPAA authorized release. There are some situations where non-covered entity does not need the patient’s authorization for their health records; these situations would be a court order. If a health care personal violate HIPAA, it can be very costly to the organization. The HIPAA fine have different categorize, if you will and have their own fines. One example, say a health care did not know they violated HIPAA. The investigation would have to prove that they did not know what he or she was doing. When that is said and done, a fine still needs to be paid. The find for this type would be a minimum of $100 per violation and the maximum is $50,000. On the other end of the scale, a person who knows that they are violating HIPAA, they will be hit with a $50,000 fine for each incident. With his fine, the company has the right to either fire the employee or take other disciplinary action, depending on the

On my day off I posted my very unbelievable encounter with my favorite super star Jerod from the band “Blue Lizards” victim of a car accident lying down all bloody and unconscious on Facebook and Instagram to prove a point. I remember learning about HIPAA regulations in nursing school, How did I forgot all of the sudden it very clear and specific regulation? The American Journal Of Trial Advocacy mandates that a states that health care provider “may not use or disclose protected health information” except as allowed by other health care providers for further treatment of the individual or for billing services. In addition, HIPAA regulation affirms that a health care provider should “obtain consent of the individual to use or disclose protected

When a HIPAA violation has taken place it is important that the person who discovers/discloses the unauthorized information immediately report to their supervisor so that they can contain the breach. The nurse in this case did not handle the case properly. There are four steps to follow through when PHI are accidentally disclosed: 1) contain the breach 2) pre-notify 3) notify 4) investigate and remedial action (Kwiatkowski, 2013). In this case, the nurse knew that she made a mistake by disclosing the young girl’s name and asked that her daughter not share the information with anybody else, but she failed to do so and the rumor quickly spread through four high schools. Therefore, the breach was not contained and further actions needed to take place. The nurse should have called her supervisor about the situation immediately so that an immediate investigation is

Although confidentiality is considered to be of great importance in therapeutic relationship, one must not assume it to be independent. In particular, confidentiality ought to be compromised whenever it conflicts with a higher moral value, such as the duty to safeguard human life. Most often physicians do not know if to disclose the HIV status of their patients to known contacts or if failure to do so may give rise to liability if the known contact becomes HIV positive. This is one of the most controversial issues in reporting and partner notification

Other concerns are conversations within the hospital cafeterias/lobbies about patients and their families, and employees sharing information throughout the hallways without a “need to know.” Once employees discover their colleagues looking at patient information without a “need to know basis,” and, other wrong doings according to the agency’s standards, their own sense of what is right and wrong instantly comes into question. Reporting the unethical behavior, the employee who had discovered the violations of patient rights is presented with a number of difficult choices. The legal basis for imposing liability for a breach of confidentiality is more extensive than ethical guidelines, which dictate the morally right thing to do.

In medicine one of the things every patient is entitled to, no matter what, is their privacy. Since ancient times the privacy between a doctor and a patient has been somewhat of sacred thing. The patient has the right to release their health information to whomever they please. Even for doctors to access a patient’s medical history there has to be consent from the patient. In Mair’s article she reports about the case PD v Harvey in which PD upon asking for her future husband’s (FH) HIV test results was denied access because of lack of consent from FH. FH because of his right to confidentiality, despite having the disease, was able to lie and forge a pathology report which reported his HIV status as negative and in turn PD was lead to believe that FH actually received a negative result. If PD had been allowed the right to view the positive result or maybe even if the doctors would have taken into consideration her well-being PD could have avoided being infected (2009). Before testing a patient for HIV/AIDS a doctor should consult the patient in this consultation the patient should be educated about the disease, the testing process, and actions to be taken upon a positive result, including disclosure to sexual

1: Classify each of the following as a violation of confidentiality, of integrity, of availability, or of some combination thereof.