Brendan J. Lyons reports an update to a breach allegation noted previously on this blog involving Samaritan Hospital and Rensselaer County jail personnel:
Two correction officers have filed a federal lawsuit accusing Rensselaer County jail officials, including Sheriff Jack Mahar, of illegally accessing their medical records after they missed work due to injuries or illness.
A third plaintiff in the lawsuit, Keith Hancock Jr., claims his medical records were improperly accessed before he was fired from his job as a correction officer more than two years ago.
[…]
The federal lawsuit was filed Friday in U.S. District Court by Hancock and jail officers Jason Dessingue and Tamera Thomas. It’s the second lawsuit alleging that Mahar and other jail officials improperly accessed medical records through a computer used to review inmates’ treatment histories. The earlier lawsuit was filed by the parents of a Melrose girl whose medical records were accessed from jail nurse’s computer after she received treatment for a bite from a dog owned by a correction officer, Ron LaFountain, who was her neighbor.
Read more on Albany Times Union.
Because less than 500 patients are involved, we will not see this on HHS’s breach tool, but hopefully, they have or are investigating the allegations of improper access and use of the hospital’s database.