The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced a $125,000 no-fault settlement and two-year corrective action plan with Allergy Associates of Hartford, P.C. (Allergy Associates) stemming from an incident involving a physician who impermissibly released protected health information (PHI) to the media.
Continue reading “Physician Provided PHI to Media When “No Comment” Would Have Sufficed”
UMass Memorial Medical Center, Inc., and UMass Memorial Medical Group, Inc. (collectively, UMass) has agreed to pay $230,000 to settle claims alleging that that they violated the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), and various other state patient privacy laws.
The Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced three separate settlements with Boston Medical Center (BMC), Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), respectively, over potential violations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rule totaling $999,000. According to the settlements, the potential violations were the result of the alleged disclosure of patient protected health information (PHI) to ABC News employees during the production and filming of the docuseries called “Save My Life: Boston Trauma,” at each hospital.
The California legislature will consider technical amendments to the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), S.B. 1121, by August 31, 2018, which is the deadline in the current legislative session for bills to be passed by the legislature.
An error made by a transcription service provider during a software upgrade on Orlando Orthopaedic Center (OOC)’s server in December 2017 has resulted in the exposure of more than 19,000 patients’ protected health information (PHI). PHI stored on OOC’s server from December 2017 until February 2018 – when the breach was finally discovered – was freely exposed over the internet without any authentication. Upon full investigation, patients’ names, social security numbers, dates of birth, insurance information, employer details, and treatment types were deemed accessible.
Continue reading “Business Associate Exposes Protected Health Information of 19,000 Patients”
The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee recently passed the Opioid Crisis Response Act of 2018 (OCRA) – a bipartisan package of more than 40 proposals designed to help families and entire communities affected by the nation-wide opioid crisis.
Continue reading “Continued Special Privacy Treatment for Substance Use Disorder Information”
