ER staff used to keep tabs on their patients with other staff, to see how they were doing, and now they aren't allowed to do so. It's the road to hell paved with good intentions.
Now I could easily imagine HIPAA being used as a scapegoat for a set of restrictive policies that are actually being driven by other incentives.
I'm not a medical person, but have had family in that role. They couldn't comment on it, but I sure can.
Informal discussion of patients has been stopped. The feedback channels that allow for discovery of subtle problems and their solutions have been removed.
ER staff used to visit their patients, and keep in touch with them, this stopped with HIPPA. This is dehumanizing.
Imagine if developers weren't ever allowed to discuss bugs in their programs, unless they were actively working on the same bug? Think of how much that would kill productivity.
What if we weren't allowed to discuss any software or OS we currently don't have a license to use? That's about how strict HIPPA is when it comes to discussing patients, at least as implemented by Hospitals.
It is far far safer for them to shut all talk about patients down, in terms of patient satisfaction, lawyers, lawsuits and fines.
I work in a hospital and I’ve never seen anything remotely like what you described. Our hospital has some of the most sophisticated monitoring systems available for inappropriate patient information access.
> Informal discussion of patients has been stopped. The feedback channels that allow for discovery of subtle problems and their solutions have been removed.
No way. I work with hospitals, there are plenty of feedback channels and cases get discussed at length. HIPAA does nothing at all to stop any communication or data sharing that is beneficial for patient safety.
> ER staff used to visit their patients, and keep in touch with them, this stopped with HIPPA. This is dehumanizing.
This is not at all true.
> Imagine if developers weren't ever allowed to discuss bugs in their programs, unless they were actively working on the same bug? Think of how much that would kill productivity.
Hospitals literally do these kinds of debriefs all the time. HIPAA does nothing to stop them at all.
> It is far far safer for them to shut all talk about patients down, in terms of patient satisfaction, lawyers, lawsuits and fines.
You totally misunderstood HIPAA, what it regulates, and how it regulates. It in no way shuts down conversations about patients. I deal with HIPAA-protected data and compliance all the time, I have no idea where you got this impression, but it was not from a doctor.
It SPECIFICALLY calls out that practitioners are allowed to describe in detail the medically relevant information of their patient to other people in the course of providing healthcare. This is NOT what HIPAA prevents, and to say otherwise is to completely understand both its stated intent AND how it's practically implemented in the field.
If you are a boarder patient (in a gurney in the hallway because there are no rooms available), a nurse or doctor IS ALLOWED to ask you questions, document your answers, and discuss your case in said hallway.
Informal discussions still happen ALL THE TIME, but practitioners use a room number rather than a patient's name, and because that information isn't personally identifiable, it's HIPAA compliant.
ER staff... still visit their patients. What on earth are you even talking about? Doctors and nurses round, they chart, they discuss and plan with one another. They communicate freely.
While there have absolutely been rare cases where information hasn't been shared as timely as it should have been (when, say, a requesting facility was foreign to another facility, and so data sharing was limited, wrongly, in the name of HIPAA), the positives of the law, which STOP a facility from just publishing your health data, or more importantly, prevent your health insurance company from broadcasting your data or selling it or using it for marketing purposes, is positive.
Patients should be able to receive quality healthcare without concern that their personal health history will be made public. HIPAA prevents the sharing of a patient's diagnosis or medical data without that patient's permission, which is how it should be.
But in terms of clinical outcomes, the hospitals still work. The nursing staff still works. And everyone knows damn sure they shouldn't be discussing a patient's name outside of work, or posting a case on the 'gram.
Everyone shares information about their active patients... but nobody can follow up or share information on former patients anymore. It's an ER specific corner case I'm worried about, as they tend to see patients actively for a short amount of time, then are shut out of their lives by HIPPA.
>or posting a case on the 'gram. There is a chilling effect on the discussion of interesting cases via social media in general... nobody wants to get fired in this atmosphere of fear. I agree that patients should have their privacy, but the pendulum has swung a bit too far.
Clinical systems, in general, are much too permissive and allow too much access to too many people.
There's absolutely nothing in HIPAA that prevents coordination of care or cross functional team communication.
HIPAA is actually a very well written law, and very reasonable.
It says things like, you can't use an EHR to mine patient data for marketing purposes.
You have to take privacy seriously and build safeguards.
You have to document that you did that.
You have to do risk analysis, and document breaches, and follow notification protocols.
I'm a former HITRUST auditor, and CTO of healthcare company. I've been deeply involved with this law for many years, and to date, I haven't found any part of it that I disagree with.
You are allowed to follow patient. You are allowed to track outcomes.
If a patient isn't actually in actually in your care, there are HIPAA defined means for reviewing cases for quality control.
All of what you described is allowed under HIPAA. It happens every day.
I followed up with my unnamed family who are in the medical world, to see if I was wrong (as the comments here so loudly proclaimed). I was told that I was generally correct and they shared my concern.
It appears I didn't express myself clearly enough, and other people weren't charitable enough in their reading of what I said to allow the benefit of the doubt.
I'll restate things, now that I've seen a day worth of feedback, as I'm interested in the truth, and not being right, I hope you'll allow this.
My observation is that the behavior of my family members has changed because of HIPPA.
Long term follow up of former patients, seems to have been completely shut down by HIPPA and the way the medical industrial complex interpreted it.
Informal learning of interesting cases (corner cases) seems to be another victim of HIPPA.
As a patient, I value privacy. I am concerned that the proverbial pendulum has swung too far, and we are cutting off a valuable (out of band signaling) mechanism for improving the practice of medicine.
Did I explain it better this time? What could I have stated differently, or more explicitly?
Thank you all for your time and attention.
After trying in vain, I've realized it's fighting windmills on an uphill battle, an I just do medical tourism. No records, paid in cash, in a different country each time
Hospitals would love to treat you as new patient every time through the door, that way it’s your responsibility to inform them of everything and anything that might impact care, it would eliminate a ton of liability for the hospital.
Start writing you state government officials and get your laws changed.
If worked for a social networking company, and I work for a hospital, you are a fool if you think hospitals have more data. At the social networking company we knew about all you health issues, we knew about your affairs, your spouses affairs, everything you’ve bought in the last 10 years, we knew if your children were actually yours, everything your children were up to, we ankles to n all your text messages, all those years their chatting you platforms, we had reciprocal agreements with them all. We knew everything you ever searched for, every porn site you visited, all your fetish’s, how much you made, your bank amounts. EVERYTHING.
I'm lazy. I travel instead. Medical tourism gives me higher quality healthcare.
> EVERYTHING
You wish. I use tor and have had no social network presence for over 10 years.
When your medical records are leaked (only a question of time) you can't say you weren't warned.