1 / 9

Legal Issues

Legal Issues. Truthfulness and Confidentiality, Ch. 5. Confidentiality. HIPAA (1996) H ealth I nsurance P ortability and A ccountability A ct Effort to codify and give national conformity to the use of confidential patient information Statutory Disclosure:

julianna
Download Presentation

Legal Issues

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Legal Issues Truthfulness and Confidentiality, Ch. 5

  2. Confidentiality HIPAA (1996) • Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act • Effort to codify and give national conformity to the use of confidential patient information Statutory Disclosure: HIPAA reinforces legal requirements to release information regarding: • Venereal disease • Poisonings • Industrial accidents

  3. Statutory Disclosure Statutory Disclosure (cont.): • Abortions • Drug abuse • Abuse of • Children • the Elderly • the Disabled These legal duties to disclose may extend to imagining professionals, state to state. Check with your employer’s risk manager

  4. Duty to Warn Tatiana Tarasoff Prosenjit Poddar Duty to Warn Third Parties: Read both scenarios on p105 Regarding Tarasoff case: • The duty to warn an endangered third party requires that the party is specifically identified (no duty to warn everyone someone knows who sounds violent) • The duty to warn an endangered third party is called a Tarasoff duty • Only Texas and Virginia have rejected the Tarasoff duty • Some jurisdictions have expanded the duty to warn beyond those specifically identified by the would-be assailant

  5. Duty to Warn Duty to Warn Third Parties (cont.): Note the discussion, final paragraph, of the imagining professional’s potential duties to warn third parties of contagious disease threats of • Family • Neighbors • Anyone physically intimate with patient Again, imagining professionals have to check with employer policies in place; note the AIDS discussion on p107

  6. Patient Access to Records Patient Access to Medical Records • HIPAA has extended the rights of patients to view what you write about them • Some exceptions to that right to their own medical records exist, depending on jurisdiction (some do not have the right to notes taken in anticipation of a lawsuit, for instance) • Parents generally have the right to view the medical records of their children

  7. Torts and Confidentiality Breach of Confidentiality: Simply note that courts do award cash to victims whose medical secrets are exposed via • Oral • Written • Computer communication The legal basis can be • Statutes defining expected conduct • Ethical duties owed to patient • Breach of fiduciary duties • Breach of contract or implied contract between doctor and patient

  8. Torts and Confidentiality Defamation: “A tort of defamation is based on the right to maintain a good reputation.” p109 • Defamation can only be claimed if the statement that defames is false • Oral defamation is slander • Written defamation is libel • Standard of legal liability is negligence • Harm must be demonstrated to succeed in a claim of defamation

  9. Torts and Confidentiality Defamation (cont.): The requirement to demonstrate harm is satisfied without need for additional information in these cases: • Criminal activity • AIDS • Venereal disease • Business, trade, or professional misdeed, or • Unchastity Such cases are called • Slander per se • Libel per se (per se means by themselves)

More Related