In a move to comply with The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act HIPPA), compliance officers around the country have forbidden doctors from talking to or about patients.
The law, passed by Congress in 1996, was designed to protect patient health information.
Patient privacy is paramount,” said HIPPA officer Chris Rose at Yale University. “There is a chance that someone could inadvertently overhear a conversation between a doctor and a patient, thus violating HIPPA.”
“Patient privacy is paramount,” said HIPPA officer Chris Rose at Yale University. “There is a chance that someone could inadvertently overhear a conversation between a doctor and a patient, thus violating HIPPA.”
Rose said that doctors are also forbidden from communicating with each other, nurses, and any other health care professional about any aspect of patient care.
In order to comply with the regulations, doctors are advised to communicate with patients only through password encrypted recorders which the patient can then listen to in a sound-proof booth.
“It will be strange never talking to or about a patient with another human being,” said Dr. Steven Groski. “We have completely changed our hospital policy on dealing with patients in cardiac arrest. However, I recognize that these concerns are trivial compared to protecting HIPPA.”
