The other day we had heard that we were getting an admit, a chest pain rule out. Then it didn't materialize, it turned out the patient was going to be transfered to a larger hospital. I said that I wonder what happened.
So the unit secretary pops on the computer and said, "Let's find out with my usual eavesdropping". I said, "Do we really have a need to know?" and she answered that she snooped all the time. I told her that her activities could be tracked, since she's logged in. She said that they've never said anything to her thus far.
What should I do? I don't want to rat on the unit secretary, but I do think that people should refrain from prying into things that don't concerned them, ala HIPAA. Our hospital is a small community hospital and so it heightens the risk of invading privacy since many people know one another.
We have a person on our unit that has looked, or been told about things, such as an employee background check and has spread things about this employee. It's hard to go to anyone about it because the person you would normally report stuff like this to is a family member of the person on our unit and is, r/o other scenarios, more than likely the person that gave out the info to begin with.
I'll contact the HIPAA person, and I'll also mention it to the Unit Secretary next time I see her that she needs to refrain from looking up information. Thanks!
Make it very clear to this individual that you will not cover for her illegal activities. Do not cover for another person's illegal activities.
There are consequences, and you now have knowledge - report this to the appropriate authority.
We had an incident years ago, when computer charting first started - several staff members looked up a collegues chart. Not only were they disciplined - but several more people who were aware of the chart snooping and but did not stop it were also disciplined.
Sooner or later this chick is going to be caught - its better if its sooner.
I worked with a US that was fired for that. It was before Hipaa was the big deal. This guy was reading the chart to an EMS that picked up the patient and it was going to be a lawsuit. We found out he did it all the time.
Almost an entire case management unit from a large hospital in my area was fired for this recently. They had all looked up a chart of a fellow employee in another department. I do not ever look anything up unless it pertains to a patient I am currently taking care of.
When my sister and I were in college in the early 1990s, we both worked at the university's hospital - I in the pharmacy and she in the billing office. Some of her co-workers were looking up friends' records and most of them stopped when they discovered things about people they knew which that person had not told them - the most common things being abortions (which this hospital did perform), suicide attempts, and to a lesser extent drug overdoses and STDs.
I never heard of anyone being fired for this, since they kept their knowledge to themselves, but they felt really embarrassed.
A well-known actress married an actor who grew up in that area and they bought a house there (which they sold after their divorce) and she had unsuccessful IVF treatment at this hospital which I knew about several years before she told the press about it. I'm not going to say who they are but everyone reading this has certainly heard of them.
After I graduated, I worked for a mail-order pharmacy that had the Screen Actors Guild contract. I spent an afternoon calling movie stars to ask them about their drug allergies and such. :bowingpur j/k. We filled a lot of prescriptions for people you would have heard of; most of it was quite routine. A person with lesser ethics might have used these addresses and phone numbers inappropriately.
I was in the hospital recently and on the floor I work on and not that I cared but everyone knew why I was there and what was going on. I even got emails from ex employees who had heard what happened. Thank God I didn't have AIDS or an STD or something I wanted to keep private.
when my sister and i were in college in the early 1990s, we both worked at the university's hospital - i in the pharmacy and she in the billing office. some of her co-workers were looking up friends' records and most of them stopped when they discovered things about people they knew which that person had not told them - the most common things being abortions (which this hospital did perform), suicide attempts, and to a lesser extent drug overdoses and stds.
[color=sienna]respectfully, i take issue w/this. it sounds like her friends, were plain old snooping. and even more, i'm not understanding your sharing of these records personal hxs, to the bb. seriously, why should we care?
i never heard of anyone being fired for this, since they kept their knowledge to themselves, but they felt really embarrassed.
[color=sienna]no one got fired because no one got caught. and i'm so sorry they were embarrassed.
a well-known actress married an actor who grew up in that area and they bought a house there (which they sold after their divorce) and she had unsuccessful ivf treatment at this hospital which i knew about several years before she told the press about it. i'm not going to say who they are but everyone reading this has certainly heard of them.
[color=sienna]again, you're trying to 'taunt' us with this well-known couple. why???
i spent an afternoon calling movie stars to ask them about their drug allergies and such. :bowingpur j/k.
[color=sienna]re: :bowingpur, are you really kidding? somehow i don't think so.
we filled a lot of prescriptions for people you would have heard of; most of it was quite routine. a person with lesser ethics might have used these addresses and phone numbers inappropriately.
[color=sienna]i can't help but struggle w/the contents of your post. definitely rubbing me the wrong way.
dekatn
307 Posts
We have a person on our unit that has looked, or been told about things, such as an employee background check and has spread things about this employee. It's hard to go to anyone about it because the person you would normally report stuff like this to is a family member of the person on our unit and is, r/o other scenarios, more than likely the person that gave out the info to begin with.