Updated to include details of the DentaQuest of Florida breach.
HHIS updated its breach tool this week, adding a baker’s dozen of incidents.
I did some digging to find details for the reports we did not know about already. Some of what I found was reported in Part 1, here. The following were also included in HHS’s most recent update to its breach tool, although as explained below, two of them probably should not be on it.
- Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration reports that a breach involving its business associate, DentaQuest of Florida affected 1,892 patients. The breach, which occurred between November 1 and December 20, 2012, involved paper records, but I can find no statement on the agency’s web site or DentaQuest’s web site to explain it. I e-mailed AHCA for details, and they responded yesterday that they will be sending me information, so look for an update to this entry. Update: According to AHCA’s spokesperson, DentaQuest (a business associate of AHCA), was the covered entity that incurred the breach which was the result of a programming error caused by a DentaQuest print vendor, OneTouchPoint CCI. DentaQuest, as a HIPAA covered entity, is conducting the breach notification process. As indicated on the attached media notice published by DentaQuest in the Miami Herald, the print vendor’s programming logic contained an error that resulted in member ID cards being mailed to the wrong addresses.”
- ABQ Health Partners was listed as having had a breach affecting 778 patients whose information was on a laptop stolen on December 20. Based on the numbers, this appeared to be a different incident than the one reported earlier in December, so I contacted ABQ. According to their spokesperson, there was no patient data at all on the laptop and there should never have been any report to HHS. When I followed up by inquiring whether there was any non-patient PII on the laptop, the spokesperson replied that there was no data on any persons on the laptop. So if you were thinking of adding this as an incident to your own analyses or chronology, forget it.
- Arizona Oncology reported that 501 patients had information on a laptop stolen on November 21. I contacted them, and a spokesperson informed PHIprivacy.net that “The report submitted to HHS was mistakenly reported as “greater than 500 people” and was corrected the following day as “less than 500 people”. She also reported that there was no patient information stored on laptops, and so there was no need to send out statements to patients. This entry, too, then, appears to be erroneous.
- Intervention Services, Inc. in Florida reported that 1,200 patients had information on a laptop stolen on January 19. Not finding anything, I e-mailed them to request more information, but have gotten no response so far.
- West Georgia Ambulance reported that 500 patients had information on a laptop that was lost on December 13. I could find no additional information on this incident.
- 1,368 patients of multiple health plans were affected by a paper records breach at Coast Healthcare Management on December 7. There is no information on their site, however, and I e-mailed them to request a copy of their notification, but have gotten no response as of the time of this posting.