What to Do If You Feel that Your Patient Rights Have Been Violated

We all know that any visit to a physician's office requires paperwork to be filled out and one of those very important papers that need to be signed is a HIPAA form. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 also known as HIPPA is a federal law that was created to protect patient confidentiality. Under this law information that is given about an individuals health becomes limited as to who can see and view any information that is provided to obtain medical care.

Together Federal Civil Rights laws and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) protect your essential rights of nondiscrimination and health information privacy. The civil rights law helps to protect you from unjust treatment or discrimination due to your race, color, nationality, disability, age, sex, or religion. The HIPPA law protects the privacy of your health information and it says who can look at and receive your health information, and it also gives you specific rights over that information.

So what do you do if you feel that any of your rights have been violated?

First of all it should be known that anyone can file a complaint so that means that a complaint can be filed for yourself or someone that you know. If you believe that in any way your rights have been violated a complaint may be filed and doing so is not a very daunting task

Requirements to file a complaint:

The complaint can be filed in writing by paper or electronically it can then be submitted by mail, fax, or email. Then the names of the unit, persons or establishment must be submitted along with a description of what took place or didn't take place that you may have felt was in violation to your rights. These forms generally have to be filed within 180 days of when you felt the action took place. The Office for Civil rights may be able to grant an extension if felt warranted. The complaint must be mailed or sent to the Office for Civil rights regional address where the discrimination or action took place. These addresses are easily found on the privacy complaint package that can be obtained at the Headquarters Office for Civil Rights.

Don't fret about retaliation:

Under the HIPPA Privacy Act an individual, persons or place cannot retaliate against you for filing a complaint. However if you feel that there is an act of retribution you should notify the Office for Civil Rights immediately.

The HIPPA Act was created because privacy is important to us all and providers and health insurances are required to follow this law. So before you just sign your life away at a doctor's office ask questions about your privacy act to better enable you in learning more about it.

Sources: http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/understanding/consumers/consumer_rights.pdf