HIPPA has been watered down, and our healthcare data is constantly being hacked. We need a new way to transport our medical records that is block chain encrypted, and resides on the person, and not on an internet connected health exchange. We should have an easy and convenient way to remove a health professional, insurer, or anyone else who has access to our records. The government should not have access to these records, and should not be able to coerce access to our records. Schools shouldn’t be allowed to require our records for enrollment. Hospitals should not be able to turn away a patient for not providing access to their records.
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Currently, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rules intersect, but there needs to be more distinction with how student health information is shared and communicated.
HIPAA allows health care providers to disclose PHI to school nurses, physicians, or other health care providers for treatment purposes without obtaining authorization from the parent or patient. {For example, a student’s pediatrician may discuss the patient’s health care needs with the school nurse responsible for administering medications and providing other health care while the student is in school.} ← This is indeed essential when students have a health condition that could urgently become life threatening, or impacts their educational experience (such as mental health conditions, etc.). However, this portion of HIPPA needs modification to REQUIRE written consent from the parent or patient (if over 18 years of age) in order to share personal health information (PHI).
Perhaps:
- establish a clear distinction between student educational records and student health records; and/or
- place all student health records regulations under FERPA OR modify current HIPPA laws with an addendum to include a sub-category for schools and students and student health records – and hold schools, school health professionals, and teachers accountable for abiding to the laws.
As a former HS teacher and a current doctor, I recognize the importance of sharing certain aspects of a students’ PHI with schools and teachers, however, there is a limit to what is necessary to be shared. For example, vaccine and immunization records are non-essential records and IMO should not be required, nor shared with schools – unless there is CONSENT to share this or any other information with schools.
Medical records should not be available to anyone (especially the government or insurance companies) that is not providing or are involved in the care of the patient. As a nurse my perspective is that HIPAA makes a pretense of ensuring privacy (by not speaking about a patient in an elevator for example or divulging the patients full name in the office) but provides broad access to the patients medical record by insurance companies, and public health entities (government). Those are precisely the entities I do not want to have access to my medical record. I really don’t care if some rando in the waiting room hears my name.
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HIPPA does not protect patient privacy. It did quite the opposite, it gave corporations access to your health data. HIPPA should be repearled and replaced with true privacy legislation.