Balance Sheets and Income Statements Essay

Patient privacy in any medical exam exam quickness is non only a right, but a law which was passed by the United States congress in 1996. The law provides the ability to transfer and overlay health insurance coverage for Ameri piece of asss when the change or lose their jobs, reduces health c argon fraud and abuse, man views industry wide standards for health care knowledge on electronic billing, and requires confidential handling of protect health nurture. The confidentiality is the portion which medical staff and their business associates develop and follow procedures that ensure the confidentiality and security of PHI, protected health discipline.California Department of Health Care Services, 2012) Many medical facilities and pharmacies throughout our country fail to comply with these HIPAA regulations and through neglect or fraudulent activity compromise a tolerants individualised health information. Channel 13 in Indiana did an investigation on pharmacies throughout our nation which discarded prescription drug labels, pill bottles, and patient information sheets with patients person-to-person information into their unsecured dumpsters around Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, D eachas, Denver, Detroit, Miami, Louisville, Philadelphia, and Phoenix.When prescriptions are dropped off, electronically transferred, or called into a pharmacy, patients assume their personal information is watch over and protected. The information given to the pharmacy consists of the patients acknowledgment, telephone number, date of birth, prescribing doctor, social security numbers, and the typeface of medication on record. This is a usurpation of federal law. Putting protected health information in a dumpster that is accessible to anyone is clearly not an example of a reasonable safeguard, verbalize Susan McAndrew, senior advisor with the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services business of Civil Rights. (Segall, 2012)Of course there were steps implemented by centering to remedy the problem. The manager of Walgreens now requires all dumpster to be locked at all times. Another Walgreens manager suggested placing all general trash in a quarantine area to be checked for patient information, sealed, sign-language(a) and dated by the inspector, and then taken to the dumpster. A CVS manager proposed having a designated area in the store to store pharmacy trash bags until they are delivered to a regional warehouse for proper disposal. (Segall,2012) Some stores whitethorn collapse high turnover rates or poor training, which births a sectionalization in indemnity and procedure methods.Removing any identifiable information from the prescription bottles before discarding them would corroborate made a difference. Shredding any identifiable information before placing it in the dumpster would have withal been sufficient. The managers of these pharmacies have to review the policy and procedures on customers privacy rights and how to properly d iscard their personal information. Each state has a pharmacy board that has rules regarding how to protect patient information the manager will need to refer to those rules and give additive training to the employees.It is proper to have a representative from an outside connection for training on HIPAA and privacy regulations. The author and interviewer spoke with a unsettled man who stating he views the content of the dumpster as a means of income. The homeless man sells items he finds in the dumpster to make money. Identity theft is an increase problem in our society. Identity theft is a crime. Patients personal information can easily be sold to a criminal, who can apply for credit and make purchases using the patients stolen information. The Golden Rule is to treat people how you would want to be treated.The state-supported should never have to think twice that a professional society would be such lack of concern about their personal information. elderly people are more b elievably to have multiple prescriptions and on a consistent basis and the pharmacy discarding their personal information can lead to identity theft. Elderly people are less likely to check or investigate any type of inconsistencies or newborn entries on their credit report. If the person is applying for any type of credit subsequently theft has happened, this can cause a denial from banks. Insured customers may xperience fraudulent use of the prescription or medical insurance information.This could cause denial of coverage at any point. This could have a broad impact on their lives and it is up to the professionals in these pharmacies to prevent this from happening. The article also told the story of a burglary after a thief found an address from the dumpster of one of their customers. This could be devastating and even fatal if these addresses are obtainable by criminals. Ethically, these pharmacies were incompetent in the way they decided to destroy these records. there is no excuse for this based on the fact they are looked upon as a professional organization and incompetency should not be an excuse. You have a duty as a physician to respect the patients trust and keep this information private. Protecting a customers confidentiality is about respect. It is the professionals duty to respect the customers information by restricting access of others to this information. Creating a trusting environment is exceedingly important. Maintaining confidentiality and respect for the privacy of others is ethically correct and expected in this type of organization.Discarding this personal information is not only ethically wrong, but legitimately wrong. This is referred to as a breach and fines are applicable in this case. In 2005, the U. S. Department of Justice clarified who could be held criminally liable for violating HIPAA regulations. This violation of placing patient information in the dumpster would fall under the HIPAA violation collect to willful neglect but violation is corrected within the mandatory time period. This fine can range from $10,000 to $250,000 annually for reiterate violations. American Medical Association, 2012) Violating HIPAA regulations is a federal law and offenses are considered a felony.The fines imposed can be devastating, but there are cases that lock time is required. CVSs breach in HIPAA regulations were taken up by The Federal Trade Commission and were fined $2. 25 million dollars. According to the complaint, CVS Caremark did not implement reasonable policies and procedures to dispose securely of personal information and did not adequately train employees. (Federal Trade Commission, 2009) It is an organizations responsibility to keep all their employees skilled on HIPAA compliance.