A bit distressed..at something an aide at the rehab place shared with me

Marie5656

Marie5656

SF VIP
Location
Batavia, NY
Yesterday, one of the aides came in to wish me well on my discharge from rehab. We were chatting a bit about things. I mentioned my roommate was looking forward to being released soon as well. The aide then, in a clear violation of HIPPA, said ""Oh, she will not be going home, they are transferring her up to long term care". She had, obviously not been told the news yet. I was silent after just saying "Oh".
I did not feel it was the aides place to share the news with me and I then felt uncomfortable talking with my roommate about my own departure,
I am still a but distressed..but on another note, I am glad I will not be there when she finds out. She will NOT be pleased.
 

When I worked in healthcare insurance customer service, I got a call from a man who wanted to know what his wife went to the doctor for. I could not even confirm she in fact did go to her doctor.

I looked at the billing code and sure enough, it was for abortion.

He tried to strong arm me, saying he and his employer paid for her medical insurance therefore had a right to know. I explained HIPAA to him but he was not happy.
 
Unfortunately there are some real immature and unprofessional people working in those places. I wanted to use one simple word but decided not to. And on the other side, there are some people practically killing themselves working in those places also.

It's kind of you to want to go visit this lady Marie.
 
Patricia said:
Is there still such thing as privacy?
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Not in this world. People seem to think hipppppa good, but it bad. Gov control and leads to much more harm than good. People forgot how things used to be when it was better, much better, without hippppa ..... Any gov agency or medical agency or social services and maybe any contractor has way to get all that so called information without telling the person /patient, while important need to know family members and friends and some true health care providers are denied.
 
Patricia said:
Is there still such thing as privacy?
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Good point .... i do not think there is ....
.the HIPPA law was more of ideal standard and like so many other things seldom enforced...... just an OOPS i will try better and remember for next time..
many healthcare groups for example have so many contractors and a quick read and sign this form does NOT infer the importance of privacy.

One place i worked at ( a blue cross company) had temp contractors get used to system by searching for friends or family to see if they were current or former customers and many by code could see previous items people were treated for.

Pre-covid if i had any visits to clinics or offices from overhearing staff chat ...........or even someone advising patients as they are walking out
I could tell most diagnosis / treatments of perfect strangers...
 
Maybe it's good you don't remember which aide it was Marie, so yes a general suggestion that HIPPA rules need to be reinforced would be good. If you are then asked why you mentioned it and/or which aide it was, you can honestly say you don't remember and the one that told you gets to keep her job.

Congratulations on your discharge. How nice of you to visit your former roommate with reading materials in hand.
 
There's lots of HIPAA violations in a lot of places. We're not even allowed to talk about patients just amongst ourselves. Even something as simple as sharing a nice moment with a patient or something they said to make you laugh. We just got scolded for that today at work. We had a nurse call a patient stupid last week. I had to turn that in. Surveyors are expected next month at any time so they best get their crap together.
 
When I worked at a rehab hospital in the billing department we were asked to each visit a few rooms every week as some patients had no visitors at all. We were to just say "hi" and ask if they needed anything. One lady assigned to me was an artist and painted her version of angels. I collected angels and she painted me a picture of one. We were not supposed to accept gifts but they made an exception and allowed me to accept it. I still treasure that angel and wonder what happened with her after she was discharged.
 
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Jeni said:
One place i worked at ( a blue cross company) had temp contractors get used to system by searching for friends or family to see if they were current or former customers and many by code could see previous items people were treated for.
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Wow that is bad. I once had a coworker in another city call me and ask if # was my bank account, and I said yes, and she said that one of their testing groups was using un-sanitized customer banking data. But the violation was taken very seriously when we reported it, so that was good. And at my last job with IRS data, we were trained half to death over and over to never ever search for tax record information on anyone we knew (or neighbors, famous people, etc).
 
HoneyNut said:
That's sad. But she would have a choice right?
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I am not sure how that works. I am sure she would have the right to dispute the decision, but if it is medically necessary, then, who knows. Her husband is in ill health...would like to see arraingements for them to be placed someone together. He does not have long to live.
 

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