Elliott Health Systems, Inc. (EHS) in New Hampshire has notified the New Hampshire Department of Justice that on February 22, 2008, 10 computers were stolen from the headquarters of a business associate, Advanced Medical Partners, Inc. (AMPI). By letter dated March 3, 2007 (sic), EHS reported that the computers may have contained ePHI on 6…
Category: Health Data
Lawyers: Doctor's info leak justified / Defense says psychiatrist wanted to show teenaged suspect did not intend to kill
An interesting news story out of Japan from the Yomiuri Shimbun: Lawyers for a psychiatrist indicted on charges of leaking confidential information about a teenage murder suspect to a freelance journalist insisted the doctor was innocent in court Monday, stating he was trying to prove the boy had not intended to kill. During the…
My Turn: Are we ready for e-medical records?
The following opinion piece, which was written by Allen Gilbert, the Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont, appeared in the Burlington Free Press today: Allen Gilbert Vermont is about to take a huge, expensive leap into the electronic medical records field. Every Vermonter who’s ever seen a doctor or been to…
Legally eHealth: Putting eHealth in its European Legal Context
From the March 2008 report’s executive summary: […] Over the past decade, a number of articles, reports, and studies have established that the use of ICTs in healthcare does raise a number of legal questions, but few have looked, in detail, at the extent to which European legislation could provide good answers. The Legally eHealth…
Privacy concerns (editorial)
Today’s Las Vegas Review-Journal has an editorial about calls for increasing the penalties under HIPAA for snooping in files: […] In the wake of the UCLA scandal, some now want to increase punishments for violating institutions, provide penalties for individual snoopers and force providers to obtain explicit instructions from patients and their families on exactly…
Hospitals often fail to notify patients of data breaches
Jon Brodkin of Network World writes: If your medical records were exposed in a security breach, would you expect the hospital to tell you? You shouldn’t. Because of regulatory loopholes, only 56% of healthcare organizations that have exposed medical records notified the patients involved, survey results issued this month found. “There are loopholes in almost…