If a doctor gives a patient medical file to her attorney including her records about the treatment for HIV is there any violations of hipaa privacy rule that may occur?

Answer 1

Under HIPAA, acting as Covered Entity, the patient's doctor may only give patient records directly to the patient's attorney if the patient signs an Authorization, as defined under HIPAA and descrbed in the doctor's Notice of Privacy Practices (NPP), as required under HIPAA (barring other relationships between the patient and her attorney, eg. if the attorney is a family member and also a Personal Representive, etc.). If however you're saying the doctor gave the record to the doctor's attorney, yes -- that's legal, but with restrictions. The attorney needs to sign a Business Associate's Agreement as defined in HIPAA, basically binding the attorney to maintain the same level of protection of the patient's information that he doctor is bound to under HIPAA. Additionally, if the attorney enters the patient's record into evidence in a trial, a previous agreement with the court must be established, that would seal the patient's records upon completion of the trial, so they don't become public record. HIPAA makes no special provisions for HIV patients. However, State Law very frequently does. HIPAA also includes the proviso that, when State law exists pertaining to medical privacy, the "more strict" law will prevail. By "more strict", HIPAA refers to whichever law more defiitively protects the patient's privacy. As such, State law may exist that would prevent such an exchange of records without additional forms being required, due to the patient's HIV Status, that would in turn activate HIPAA's "more strict" proviso. Note that HIPAA treats Psychotherapy Notessomewhat differently. While other violations are not described under current HIPAA case law or codicil, the patient should note that, once Protected Health Information (PHI) is entered into the public record (eg. as it would in a trial), unless the court specifically rules to strike such material from the public record, that information may become public. This means that the patient's Attorney is prevented from revealing the information under Attorney/Client Privilege, the doctor may not reveal said information as prescribed under HIPAA, but anyone else with legal access to the court record may do so, unless provisions under State Law further protect this. Note that nothing in this description may be or is intended to be construed as legal advice.