Medical Privacy at Risk!! Sign Petition to Delay HIPAA

[Graphicd00d]

What is HIPAA?

HIPAA stands for (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996).

Here is a quote from AAPSonline.org

"Under the new federal rules passed in the "HIPAA" bill, your medical records will be sent to third- parties -- such as the government, marketers, and insurance companies -- without your consent.

But we don't think that's the solution either. Under those rules, if you refused to sign the consent, your doctor could be forced to withhold treatment, or be prosecuted for treating you without the government consent form.
That's not consent - that's coercion!

AAPS has been working since 1996 to stop these terrible regulations. We've filed lawsuits and are trying to repeal them in Congress.

But in the meantime, they go into effect in April 2003. The only guaranteed way to protect your privacy is to ask your doctor to become a "non-covered" entity under HIPAA. "

Read up on HIPAA at AAPSonline.org

This effects medical professionals even more so (i.e. $250,000 fines and 10 years in jail for not following the thousands and thousands of pages of bureaucratic B.S.!)

Help spread the word and sign the petition

Your medical privacy is at risk on April 14,2003!

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Absolute BS

If a health practitioner sends your medical information to marketeers, that is a 10 year jail term/250,000 dollar fine. The only way this happens is if you grant written authority that spell out in plain english what may be disclosed, and to whom, and for what purposes. HIPAA sucks, but not because of what you have stated. Health providers DO NOT need permission to function as health professionals, or to bill insurance companies, so denial of services is not going to happen. Further, the only thing the patient is supposed to sign is a statement acknowleging his or her rights under the act. If the patient does not sign, HIPAA explicitly states that the patient MAY NOT be denied services. All the practioner needs do is document a good faith effort to get the signature.

 

[Sundog]

I work for a medical device manufacturer. I am the designated HIPAA Privacy Manager (just found out my new duties yesterday).

HIPAA is quite over the top...it really makes NO sense.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Originally posted by: Sundog
I work for a medical device manufacturer. I am the designated HIPAA Privacy Manager (just found out my new duties yesterday).

HIPAA is quite over the top...it really makes NO sense.

Oh NO!

As a health care provider, I had the manditory training too. You have to do all the business contracts if there is any personally identifiable info. Ewww ewww ewwww. I hope you got a big raise, because it is now your new job.

 

[MPankau]

Okay, first things first. The original post is not accurate at all. I am the HIPAA official for a healthcare institution. Here are the facts about HIPAA:

1) When you begin treatment, or visit your doctor, dentist, hospital, any health related service. You will be asked to sign a disclosure form. This form details who your medical records will be released to, in detail. It may be for marketing purposes, or fundraising, but it all layed out for you, just read it!
2) Your health information is open to free access to your healthcare provider for TREATMENT RELATED activities. That does inlcude billing and insurance verification also.
3) You may at any time request restrictions on your health information. Your provider may NOT refuse treatment to you because of those restrictions unless they are allowed access to LESS than the MINIMUM necessary information to provide care.
4) At any time you have the right to see a record of all the disclosures of your health information. That means you can see who got it, when and why.

HIPAA is for the privacy of the individual. The original post is from the private physicians of america. They are overwhelmed at the extra burdens and paperwork that HIPAA means for the PROVIDER. That is why they are against HIPAA. The only thing HIPAA means to the recipient is that they must sign an extra form detailing who their PHI (Private Health Information) may be disclosed to. That is all.

Please do not post things like this unless you know exactly what you are talking about.

 

Privacy is a thing of the past in America, don't you get it already?

 

[MPankau]

Yes there are tremendous responsibilities for the provider, as there should be. I am the HIPAA officer also and have dealt with all those things. But, these laws are for the protection of the individual, not the provider. Yes, it's work, but that's what you are paid for.

MP

 

[vi edit]

The only thing HIPAA means to the recipient is that they must sign an extra form detailing who their PHI (Private Health Information) may be disclosed to. That is all.

Somebody is going to bear the burden of the billions of dollars needed to meet HIPPA compliance....and I can tell you right now the providers sure as hell aren't going to be the ones.

 

[MPankau]

I said nothing to the cost of HIPAA, i agree rates will go up. But would rather, turn on the tv, see your face on a commercial for prostrate cancer, or pay a few more bucks for health insurance?

MP

 

[Geekbabe]

If anything HIPAA simply makes into law what ethical providers have been doing for years anyway,safe guarding your right to privacy! No more instances of sitting in your doctor's office while he/she takes a call
about another patient and identifies that patient by name.Unless you designate permission,nobody in your family will be able to just call your doctor and get your test results.

HIPAA puts the full onus on covered entities to protect your privacy,it unifies billing sets which ultimately will save consumers money and provides consumers of health care services with a form of legal address if they are damaged by a health care providers disregard for their privacy.

 

[brentman]

HIPAA is definitely overwhelming. Our company has some idiot in charge of it (it seems) and if you ask him questions all you get is "I think this.. " or "it seems to me that.." like the HIPAA stuff isnt very well described. I'm glad its not my responsibility.

Much respect to those of you who have to wade through the voluminous HIPAA texts. I know the one official rule book thing is 287 pages long!

 

[MPankau]

Almost, your family may know about your treatment by default unless you specifically request that they not be told. But if you request it, they can't even leave a message on your voicemail if they wanted to.

MP

 

[ElFenix]

are they allowed to sell my info to other companies to begin with? why don't they just make 1 law 1 sentence long saying that?

 

[MPankau]

It's not selling your information. It would be like if i was a hospital and I hired a company to do marketing research to find out my average patient age, demographic, sex, and diagnosis information. They would see all sorts of private info. The marketing firm would be forced to sign as part of the contract a statement saying that this info is for statistical purposes only and will not but used for other reasons. and if you ever asked to find out who has ever seen my info, i would have to include that firm on the list.

They can't make just one law, because the topic is way too broad. From tv marketing, to daily stats, to providing care, to 3rd party billing companies, to collection agencies. The reules and rights havae to be blatently spelled out.

MP

 

[Yeeny]

I am in the medical field, and HIPAA, while a pain in the ass with alot of its rules, is really a good thing to have. It SHOULD be common sense to keep people's stuff private, but its not, and this way if a provider does something stupid, such as releasing your information, at least there is some punishment for it now. Read some of the horror stories out there, that have been committed by doctors and pharmacys. Such as the woman whose ex husband went into the pharmacy, got copies of all her medications, and then tried to use them in court against her. Or the doctor who went into his employees medical records at the hospital they both worked at, saw that she had cancer, and then fired her, later claiming that he was worried about her health at work. There are a ton of them.

And it goes into affect Monday.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Originally posted by: MPankau
It's not selling your information. It would be like if i was a hospital and I hired a company to do marketing research to find out my average patient age, demographic, sex, and diagnosis information. They would see all sorts of private info. The marketing firm would be forced to sign as part of the contract a statement saying that this info is for statistical purposes only and will not but used for other reasons. and if you ever asked to find out who has ever seen my info, i would have to include that firm on the list.

They can't make just one law, because the topic is way too broad. From tv marketing, to daily stats, to providing care, to 3rd party billing companies, to collection agencies. The reules and rights havae to be blatently spelled out.

MP

BTW, this can still be done without disclosure. The covered provider (covered meaning a company or person that the law applies to ) just needs to make sure any personally identifiable information (Name, address, phone number, SSN etc) is removed. Often, this is done for medical studies that analyze treatment. This is known as de-identification. De-identified info is not protected. Thats a good thing.

 

[Sundog]

Originally posted by: Hayabusarider

Originally posted by: MPankau
It's not selling your information. It would be like if i was a hospital and I hired a company to do marketing research to find out my average patient age, demographic, sex, and diagnosis information. They would see all sorts of private info. The marketing firm would be forced to sign as part of the contract a statement saying that this info is for statistical purposes only and will not but used for other reasons. and if you ever asked to find out who has ever seen my info, i would have to include that firm on the list.

They can't make just one law, because the topic is way too broad. From tv marketing, to daily stats, to providing care, to 3rd party billing companies, to collection agencies. The reules and rights havae to be blatently spelled out.

MP

BTW, this can still be done without disclosure. The covered provider (covered meaning a company or person that the law applies to ) just needs to make sure any personally identifiable information (Name, address, phone number, SSN etc) is removed. Often, this is done for medical studies that analyze treatment. This is known as de-identification. De-identified info is not protected. Thats a good thing.

De-Identiying PHI: Health information that does not include the individual's identity or a reasonable basis to identify the individual is not PHI.

To meet this standard, the data can not include:
- name
- geographic subvision smaller than a state
- telephone or fax numbers, e-mail address
- Social Security number
- medical record number
- member/beneficiary identification
- account numbers (i.e. from provider)
- license numbers
- device identifiers and serial numbers
- date of birth, date of admit/discharge
- photographs

 

[KC5AV]

Do you have any idea what you are talking about? HIPAA might not be the best solution, but that article is utter bull.

 

[Graphicd00d]

HIPAA is for the privacy of the individual. The original post is from the private physicians of america. They are overwhelmed at the extra burdens and paperwork that HIPAA means for the PROVIDER. That is why they are against HIPAA. The only thing HIPAA means to the recipient is that they must sign an extra form detailing who their PHI (Private Health Information) may be disclosed to. That is all.

Yeah and the USAPATRIOT Act defends us from terrorists. Did you even look at the aaps.org website? It's a non-profit organization that has been around since the 40's. I have read what HIPAA does. I have talked to medical professionals and they don't like it one bit. It will interfere with how they do their job which is treating his/her patients the best way they can.

Please do not post things like this unless you know exactly what you are talking about.

Interesting, you joined this month just to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I just posted some info that is from a reliable source. Don't believe me or MPankau. Go do the research yourself. Even Sen. Ron Paul from Texas (who is also a M.D. and is a member of AAPS since the 60's) thinks it's bad news.

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: Graphicd00d

HIPAA is for the privacy of the individual. The original post is from the private physicians of america. They are overwhelmed at the extra burdens and paperwork that HIPAA means for the PROVIDER. That is why they are against HIPAA. The only thing HIPAA means to the recipient is that they must sign an extra form detailing who their PHI (Private Health Information) may be disclosed to. That is all.

Yeah and the USAPATRIOT Act defends us from terrorists. Did you even look at the aaps.org website? It's a non-profit organization that has been around since the 40's. I have read what HIPAA does. I have talked to medical professionals and they don't like it one bit. It will interfere with how they do their job which is treating his/her patients the best way they can.

Please do not post things like this unless you know exactly what you are talking about.

Interesting, you joined this month just to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I just posted some info that is from a reliable source. Don't believe me or MPankau. Go do the research yourself. Even Sen. Ron Paul from Texas (who is also a M.D. and is a member of AAPS since the 60's) thinks it's bad news.

Uhh...you just quoted MPakau!

 

[Graphicd00d]

Originally posted by: conjur

Originally posted by: Graphicd00d

HIPAA is for the privacy of the individual. The original post is from the private physicians of america. They are overwhelmed at the extra burdens and paperwork that HIPAA means for the PROVIDER. That is why they are against HIPAA. The only thing HIPAA means to the recipient is that they must sign an extra form detailing who their PHI (Private Health Information) may be disclosed to. That is all.

Yeah and the USAPATRIOT Act defends us from terrorists. Did you even look at the aaps.org website? It's a non-profit organization that has been around since the 40's. I have read what HIPAA does. I have talked to medical professionals and they don't like it one bit. It will interfere with how they do their job which is treating his/her patients the best way they can.

Please do not post things like this unless you know exactly what you are talking about.

Interesting, you joined this month just to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I just posted some info that is from a reliable source. Don't believe me or MPankau. Go do the research yourself. Even Sen. Ron Paul from Texas (who is also a M.D. and is a member of AAPS since the 60's) thinks it's bad news.

Uhh...you just quoted MPakau!

Sorry. I meant the first sentence for him and the rest for everyone else.

 

[Graphicd00d]

Here is a transcript of a conference about HIPAA from the Cato Institute.

Kaisernetwork.org

Transcript