P.J. Reilly reports in the Intelligencer Journal:
A medical practice in East Hempfield Township is contacting nearly 12,000 of its patients to notify them that a computer was stolen from the office April 17.
The computer contained the names, addresses, telephone numbers and Social Security numbers of many of the patients who visited the office of General Internal Medicine of Lancaster, 2301 Columbia Ave., from 2005 through 2007.
[…]
“We’re just sick about this,” said practice manager Lois Summers. “We know that the computer didn’t contain the information of all (12,000) patients, but we notified everyone we saw during that three-year period just to be safe.”
According to Summers, office workers on April 17 were taking paper records bearing basic patient information and scanning them into a laptop computer so the records could then be transferred to a disk.
After that process was completed, the office planned to burn the paper records.
Summers said no medical information about patients was compromised.
“We have to keep the records in case an insurance company calls us, but we don’t have to keep them on paper,” she said.
An employee left the area where the scanning was being done for a brief period the morning of April 17. When that employee returned, Summers said, the laptop was gone.
Full story – Intelligencer Journal