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Comment by anonu | Hacker News Reader

HIPAA is sort of a joke to me. My perspective being that of a patient. Any doctor's office just blindly asks you sign a HIPAA authorization release form. Most patients don't realize that you have a choice to "opt out" and not sign it. But even then it doesn't matter because under HIPAA the provider may still choose to share your personal information for their own reasons.

Sure, I am doing a lot of "hand waving"- I'm not an expert on the law. I'm merely sharing my perspective on this. Would love to understand more about this specific authorization...

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> Any doctor's office just blindly asks you sign a HIPAA authorization release form.

I've never been asked to waive my rights. I have been asked to sign that I received their notice of privacy practices. (Almost always having not been actually given any to read, which is fairly infuriating.)

> But even then it doesn't matter because under HIPAA the provider may still choose to share your personal information for their own reasons.

Only in certain specific situations.

> Any doctor's office just blindly asks you sign a HIPAA authorization release form.

You are incorrect. You are being asked to acknowledge that you received a copy of their privacy policies. You can decline and it doesn't change very much (if anything), because they will still document that they informed you of them... which they did.

It's understandable that people don't read what they're signing; I often don't have time, either. But you are posting about that form having not paid much attention to it, which is less common, in my experience.

Any HIPAA authorization form I have signed has had me spell out who is allowed to have access to my records, like my wife or another Doctor’s office. Did you read what you signed?

HIPAA was never meant to prevent direct communication between clinicians regarding a shared patient's healthcare needs and issues in order to provide the best and safest care possible.

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