By Craig Phillips Since 13,000 ways to be sick, injured, or mortally wounded were not enough, we now have about 70,000 ways. This includes codes for “parrot bites” and “sucked into a jet engine.” There is also V97.33XD – “sucked into jet engine, subsequent encounter;” what patient was sucked into a jet engine, survived, …
Responding to Subpoenas and Other Requests for Personal Health Information: Take Them at Face Value
By Billee Ward Healthcare providers and other HIPAA covered entities receive requests for protected health information (“PHI”) from a variety of sources on a daily basis. Such requests can range from informal requests made during the course of conversation with a patient or family member, to written requests or demands served by law enforcement personnel …
Legal and Regulatory Landscape for Mobile Health Technologies
By Brian Balow Mobile health (mHealth) technologies continue to expand in application and implementation. Over the past decade, the breadth of these technologies has grown from the creation of healthcare-directed websites (think WebMD) to implanted medical devices that constantly transmit and receive information (sometimes on a device-to-device basis). If you are either a provider or …
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PHIPA offers “no shelter” to Ontario Hospital from class proceedings for breach of privacy
By Wendy Hulton Back in 2012, the Ontario Court of Appeal recognized the tort of invasion of privacy – fast forward to the recent string of privacy breaches of personal information held by health care facilities in Ontario. Along comes Hopkins v Kay, 2014 ONSC 321 (CanLII), where patients from the Peterborough Regional Health Centre …
HHS Delays NPP Amendment Requirement for Laboratories Regulated Under CLIA
By Scott Roberts Under the HIPAA Privacy Rule, a Covered Entity is required to revise its notice of privacy practices (“NPP”) where there is a material change to any of its privacy policies. The HIPAA/HITECH Omnibus Final Rule (the “Omnibus Rule”) issued earlier this year requires a number of changes to privacy policies that will …
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Legal Issues in Keeping Patients’ Credit Card Information on File
Many physicians find credit cards to be the easiest way of accepting payment, and some will even keep their patient’s credit card information on file in case a patient fails to pay their bill. What many of these physicians do not realize, however, is that electronically storing a patient’s credit card information opens them up …
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In Reversing the Dismissal of a Healthcare Data Breach Class Action, the Eleventh Circuit Shows the Importance of Encryption
By Tatiana Melnik In early September 2012, the Eleventh Circuit decided Resnick v. AvMed, Inc., reversing, in part, a motion to dismiss, and thereby permitting a class action against AvMed, a Florida health plan provider, that arose from the theft of unencrypted information to move forward. Specifically, the Court ruled that: (1) plaintiffs claiming actual …