When examining the case of the State of California against Dr Zhou, we can clearly conclude that the HIPAA law of which was convicted of violated is not just words written on paper to buy patients' confidence, it is meaningful law set in place to protect patient privacy and any ones violating this law, regardless of your position in the health care field can be persecuted punished for violating the law, even in the absence damages evidence resulting from the violation of the law. The purpose of this post is to discuss the case of the State of California against the physician, Dr Huping Zhou, in this post I will review the HIPAA law, penalties for violation of the law and why I felt that Doctor Zhou was very fortunate for his punishments four
This time also they sell all their junk to the third party. This time the breach was occurred due to the improper disposal of the hardware and the negligence of the IT employee. With this second breach of the HIPAA violation the HHS imposed $50k fine on the clinic and the hospital administration fired the employee and HHS imposed a fine of $10k on the
As a result of HIPPA Privacy Rules the processes of the healthcare has changed. The HIPPA Privacy Rule may now supersede state laws. At first the Privacy Rule was only a federal floor or minimum of privacy requirements so it does not preempt or supersede, stricter state statues or other federal statues. The word stricter refers to state and federal statues that provide individuals with greater privacy protection and gives individuals greater rights with the respect to their personal health information.
The act is meant to followed by the rules, but the state can change certain thing according to the way it believes HIPAA should be done. If someone were to commit theft, he or she would have to pay thousand in fines and be sentenced to ten years of imprisonment. The hospitals and medical institutes must call, mail, email, or use the media to inform the victims that his or her information is a risk. They will have up to 30 days to contact everyone involved or an additional 30 if he or she is having trouble finding a large number of people or if the police have to become part of the solution.
The first article was a summary of the HIPAA Privacy Rule. In the article, there was an introduction on what HIPAA meant and its importance. First off, HIPAA stands for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 and it is a disclosure of patient information so that it is protected from unknown individuals and to assure that health providers abide by the privacy rule. Some key facts about HIPAA were, who was covered, what information is protected, and administrative requirements. Noncompliance and criminal penalties were some of the critical issues found in the article.
When it comes to a patient that does not speak English the first thing we have to do is find someone capable and a professional to translate, complying with all the HIPAA regulations are being taken care of and not violated. Whether it is a live person, over the phone service or if available online. We cannot ask a family member to serve as a translator because we might break the patient confidentiality if the patient does not want anybody knowing his diagnosis and the procedures being done to them. With a deaf patient first we have to find out what is the best way to communicate with the patient if by reading lips always face them forward so they can read our lips, speaking clearly so they can understand a little better what we are trying
The ethical principles and theory above are examples of why the HIPAA regulations need to be amended to address the use of genetic information. If HIPAA regulations include the release of genetic information, the uniformed sister can be aware of her possible genetic mutation. However, with the current HIPAA policy Mrs. Smith’s genetic information can only be released with her consent. HIPAA 's current policy does not seem fair regarding the uninformed sister’s circumstances. Nurses and doctors are expected to care for their patients to the best of their ability, but with the current HIPAA policies their duties are
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is a vital part of the health care industry’s day to day business. HIPAAs procedures define how healthcare companies receive and handle their clients’ health care information. HIPAA helps to protect the patient’s personal information through confidentiality and security procedures while being transferred, handled or shared with other healthcare providers (Modifications to the HIPAA Privacy, Security, Enforcement, and Breach Notification Rules, 2013). When a patient’s privacy is not regulated, third parties could buy and sell the information without the patients’ authorization. With HIPAA being in place, it prevents healthcare employees from divulging any patient information they
All healthcare professionals, whether it is the receptionists all the way up to the owner of the hospital, are going to have heard about HIPAA at some point in their employment. The punishment is pretty hefty, so that is probably why there are only a couple of cases with violations of HIPAA resulting in criminal severities. The legalities of breaching PHI “to a third party carries a jail term of up to 10 years in addition to a maximum fine of $500,000 if the disclosure is made
The HIPAA rule is built to protect and prevent disclosing individuals’, and consumers’ identifiable health care information unlawfully and without getting authority from the concern parties. If someone break the law, individuals are subject to civil penalties of $100 on each violation but the penalty can accumulates based on numbers of violations; the standard maximum limit of civil penalties is $25,000 each person, each year (HIPAA Privacy Rule – What Employers Need to Know, n. d.). As per stacking rules, if a person violated two HIPAA standards, the penalty can be $50,000; Similarly, the criminal penalties subject to maximum of $ 250,000 and ten years in prison can be imposed to those individuals and parties who disclosed protected information
New York-Presbyterian Hospital and Columbia University Medical Center finally agreed in 2014 to pay a settlement of $4.8 million dollars for HIPPA violations that happened in 2010 (McCann, 2014, para. 2). The violation involved patients’ electronic health records data being found on Google. According to McCann (2014), “the HIPPA breach transpired when a CU physician, who developed applications for NYP and CU, attempted to deactivate a personally-owned computer server on the network containing ePHI’ (para. 3). Because the hospital lacked technical safeguards, the patients’ electronic health records were be able to be accessed once server was deactivated. Because the institutions were fined a record setting of $4.8 million dollars,
1. Locate an interesting article about a HIPAA violation in which a healthcare professional breached patient confidentiality. According to New York Times Article “New York –Presbyterian Hospital has agreed to pay a $2.2 million penalty to federal regulators for allowing television crews to film two patients without their consent- one which was dying, the other in significant distress. Regulators said on Thursday that the hospital allowed filming to continue even after a medical professional asked that it stop.” (Ornstein, 2016) a. Explain how HIPAA was violated
As records were shared electronically rules were implemented for clinicians to follow known as The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996 (Summary of the HIPAA Security Rule ,2013). These rules were implemented for clinicians to protect the
Not to mention termination from their present position. The hospital system has to repair its damaged reputation while at the same time prepare to defend itself against potential civil/criminal lawsuits. There are too many incidences were an organization is liable for HIPAA
CAL. FAM. CODE § 6926 (2012). DIAGNOSIS OR TREATMENT OF INFECTIOUS, CONTAGIOUS, OR COMMUNICABLE DISEASES; CONSENT BY MINOR TO CERTAIN MEDICAL CARE; LIABILITY OF PARENTS OR GUARDIANS (a) A minor who is 12 years of age or older and who may have come into contact with an infectious, contagious, or communicable disease may consent to medical care related to the diagnosis or treatment of the disease, if the disease or condition is one that is required by law or regulation adopted pursuant to law to be reported to the local health officer, or is a related sexually transmitted disease, as may be determined by the State Public Health Officer.
