Once the physician-patient relationship has been established, there are countles
ID: 395260 • Letter: O
Question
Once the physician-patient relationship has been established, there are countless legal and ethical obligations that you, as the healthcare provider’s employee, are bound by, e.g. the Patient Privacy Rule (HIPAA). Maintaining a patient’s privacy is, perhaps, one of the areas that poses that greatest potential for an unintentional or inadvertent “mishap” by an uninformed healthcare employee, particularly during the current environment of widespread social media usage (which we will discuss in-depth in a few weeks).
What can you say to a patient’s employer who calls to find out if the employee’s injury/medical condition has improved? Does it matter if the patient incurred his injury/condition at work? Does it matter if the patient is employed by relative, e.g., an uncle?
Explanation / Answer
When a patient’s employer calls me to find out whether the employee’s medical condition has been improved I would ask the employer to get the written permission from the employee to avail the information. HIPAA prohibits employers from accessing medical records of employees without their consent. It does not matter if the patient incurred injury/ condition at work and the patient consent is essential to furnish the medical information. The information can be provided as part of health plans provided by the company to help the patient, but that also requires authorization from the patient.
If the employer is the employee’s relative, the details can be shared only if he is the patient’s personal representative. But there are certain exceptions. If the relative seeking information is involved in the payment for the healthcare or the patient does not object sharing the information or if according to my professional judgment I believe that the patient does not object sharing the information, I can share the information with the employer who is a relative.
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