What do they teach these days in school?!

brownbook · May 23, 2019

HIPAA wasn't invented when I went to school. Even so it has to be part of nursing orientation and addressed annually as part of nursing competency? It was at every facility I worked in.

FeliciaRNCPN · May 23, 2019

We do online modules about it yearly but i'm guessing most people just skip through it to get it done.

brownbook · May 23, 2019

55 minutes ago, FeliciaRNCPN said:
We do online modules about it yearly but i'm guessing most people just skip through it to get it done.

Yeah, we all skip through the modules. Irregardless of the topic. But a basic HIPAA principle of not accessing a patient's medical information who is not your patient...that's just basic nursing 101.

MunoRN, RN · May 23, 2019

It's not a HIPAA violation to access patient information for the purpose of evaluating your care. Facilities and organizations are required to ensure that the information is being accessed to evaluate the care you provided, and they often require that you review this information under the supervision of a hospital rep, but I have also worked at hospitals that allowed independent access of patient information for evaluating care with well defined parameters.

Oldmahubbard · May 23, 2019

You can't access any information out of curiosity. It does not matter if the patient was yours in the past, you know the person and it's ok, a second cousin is in the hospital, etc, etc.

It's very easily tracked, and always has been.

Personally I think if you are curious about a patient, you are overinvolved

JKL33 · May 24, 2019

On 5/22/2019 at 9:09 PM, FeliciaRNCPN said:
I confronted a nurse who was looking up her previous patient who had been transferred to a higher level of care. Her was response was "whatever, I don't even care!" I then explained to her that it was HIPAA violation 1) could be flagged by corporate 2) could result in discipline and 3) could be reported to the BON. Her response was, "I don't get why, he was my patient so how is that a HIPAA violation?
I of course explained to her why it would be inappropriate but she sort of just blew my off. Seriously? She graduated in the last two years and doesn't get why this a problem?
End of rant.
Any one else have experience with this?

Yeah, I have some experience with it.

It's one of the biggest losses for learners everywhere to now be effectively disallowed by "privacy practices" from learning by reviewing a course of care that they were intimately involved in.

It was mostly a non-problem that has been made into a problem because it is easier for humongous corporations with thousands of employees to monitor appropriate access by applying restrictions that the spirit of HIPAA does not require.

14 hours ago, MunoRN said:
It's not a HIPAA violation to access patient information for the purpose of evaluating your care.

Thank you.

JKL33 · May 24, 2019

12 hours ago, Oldmahubbard said:
You can't access any information out of curiosity. It does not matter if the patient was yours in the past, you know the person and it's ok, a second cousin is in the hospital, etc, etc.
It's very easily tracked, and always has been.
Personally I think if you are curious about a patient, you are overinvolved

The concept of curiosity has been sullied because it also includes what we might call idle curiosity, which is often found in association with things like gossip.

A chart review for the purposes of evaluating one's involvement in a case would be better referred to as purposeful inquiry rather than [idle] curiosity.

It used to be that people who didn't care about the outcomes of their patients were mostly those who just literally didn't care about the outcomes of their patients (thus also not too concerned about the quality of their own involvement in that and future cases, and not too concerned about the sciences involved). Now, it's nearly the opposite, and as your comment kind of implies, people are "weird" for being "curious."

Sad!

Oldmahubbard · May 24, 2019

Not weird, I have definitely experienced this.

Jory, MSN, APRN, CNM · Jun 11, 2019

I recently reported a family member for a HIPAA violation. I have a patient that has been in the hospital for the last three days and her sister (who is not her POA) said, "Well, I work in <fill in department> and pulled up her chart and it said <fill in grave misunderstanding of what she saw here because OB is not her area>".

I don't know what is going to happen to her and frankly I don't care. HIPAA is not rocket science and it's not hard. I have zero tolerance for people that refuse to follow it.

Forest2 · Jun 14, 2019

If they aren't coming soon to be cared for by me or I am not actively caring for the patient. I stay out of the chart. That is the best thing to do I think.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Jun 16, 2019

On 5/22/2019 at 8:09 PM, FeliciaRNCPN said:
I confronted a nurse who was looking up her previous patient who had been transferred to a higher level of care. Her was response was "whatever, I don't even care!" I then explained to her that it was HIPAA violation 1) could be flagged by corporate 2) could result in discipline and 3) could be reported to the BON. Her response was, "I don't get why, he was my patient so how is that a HIPAA violation?
I of course explained to her why it would be inappropriate but she sort of just blew my off. Seriously? She graduated in the last two years and doesn't get why this a problem?
End of rant.
Any one else have experience with this?

Yes, I’ve had experience with this and I’ve learned that it is not possible for me to control someone else’s behavior. I doubt that you can do so either. Let it go. You tried to warn her; now let her find out the hard way.