This may come as a shock. AP reports:
Connecticut’s highest court ruled Thursday on an issue that most people may think is already settled, saying doctors have a duty to keep patients’ medical records confidential and can be sued if they don’t.
The Supreme Court’s 6-0 decision overturned the ruling of a lower court judge who said Connecticut had yet to recognize doctor-patient confidentiality.
The high court’s ruling reinstated a lawsuit by former New Canaan resident Emily Byrne against the Avery Center for Obstetrics & Gynecology in Westport.
Read more on Boston Herald, while I scratch my head over this one. Connecticut health law never required confidentiality? Seriously? From reading the rest of the article, it sounds like the center had a pretty clear privacy policy that made it clear that they might disclose in response to subpoenas, but even so…..
So for all this time, mental health patients in Connecticut had no enforceable right to confidentiality? Or was there an exception for mental health?
How could this be????
Why are you just limiting confidentiality to just mental health patients?
No patient at an ENT, GP, oncology, GI, office too.
I didn’t limit it. I was asking whether there had been any protection for mental health patients as some states have additional and specific laws concerning mental health records and treatment.
So by their definition wouldn’t patients be able to sue doctors that release everyone’s prescription information? (Prescription Drug Monitoring)
Enforcing HIPPA, selectively is BS in my book.
Doctors and Pharmacists should be sued for revealing patients prescription records without a warrant. But that will never happen because the War on Drugs is never-ending.
You have to read the sections of HIPAA that address permissible disclosures where no additional consent is required.
That said, yeah, these DEA initiatives to require states to compile and share Rx info are very troubling.