Allergy Practice Discloses Patient Info to Reporter, Pays $125,000

An article in Bloomberg Law’s Health Law & Business, “Allergy Practice Discloses Patient Info to Reporter, Pays $125,000,” discussed a recent HIPAA settlement arising out of a physician’s disclosure of a patient’s protected health information (PHI) to a television reporter. Rivkin Radler’s Eric Fader was quoted in the article.

The settlement was announced on November 26 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR). Eric told Bloomberg Law that the medical practice got off easy considering how blatant the violation was. “I’m actually surprised that it took the OCR this long to publicize a settlement of this type,” he added, referring to providers’ disclosures of PHI in their responses to patient complaints on Yelp and in other public forums.

“Healthcare providers will always need reminders and periodic retraining on HIPAA, as the law itself requires,” Eric concluded.