Question

Discuss the legal issues related to ownership, control and use, and disclosure of health information.

Answer 1

Medical information, a person’s medical history data, is not governed by a single legal framework. Federal and state rules and regulations should be considered before the disclosure of health information. Health information is defined based on its content, source, and form when it comes to applying legal protections/restrictions related to ownership, control and use, and disclosure. These are not mutually exclusive, so several overlapping rights might apply to one specific record or patient information, complicating the ownership rights. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), the law to protect medical privacy, which came into effect on April 14, 2003, has standards for disclosure of information. HIPPA applies to covered entities that transmit specific health information electronically.

The Privacy and Security Framework’s Individual Choice principle highlights that a person’s right to make choices regarding the electronic transmission of his/her recognizable health information has an important role in building trust. The Privacy Rule grants an individual many rights meant to empower him/her to be a more lively participant in controlling his/her health information. These include the right to access the individual’s health information; the right to amend health information; the right to obtain an account of disclosures; the right to obtain a covered entity’s privacy practice notice; the right to agree, object, or authorize, disclosures; the right to request limitations of uses and disclosures and provisions that allow a covered entity to receive consent for uses and disclosures. This being said, the Privacy Rule’s provisions of optional consent gives covered entities the choice to approve use and disclosure policies build on the Privacy Rule’s basic requisites and reflect the best judgment and professional ethics of a covered entity, which gives them an upper hand. The covered entities can make the choice regarding the decision to obtain a patient’s consent to disclose or use health information for treatment, payment, and healthcare management purposes; and regarding the content of the consent and the method of obtaining it. Another fact is that the Privacy Rule does not stop a covered entity from instituting any policy that requires the patient’s consent to make disclosures that are otherwise allowed by the Privacy Rule without the patient’s consent or authorization.