I was just wondering are there HIPAA laws in England??? If not are there any similar laws that prevent just anyone from acquiring protected health information (PHI) on a patient. As the law goes in the states, not just anyone can gain access to a person's PHI without a valid written release form signed by the patient.Also hospital staff are not authorized to release information via telephone about the condition and or diagnosis of a patient that has been in that facility even if it is the patient calling themselves. I recently got a complaint from a guy in england who was calling to ask the condition of his brother who was here at the hospital i work at in the U.S. Both he and his brother are from England. and he went on a tagent about how Americans are idiots and how he didn't understand why i couldn't release that information on his brother. blah blah blah... long story short he was furious!!! i was just wondering if this is just a U.S. thing.
2007-12-26 14:02:53 · 3 answers · asked by la loca 3 in Politics & Government ➔ Law & Ethics
Yeah i understand the guy's frustration, the only reason we don't release information over the telephone is because there is no way to verify that the person on the other line is in fact who they say they are...they could be someone with malicious intent pretending to be a grieving loved one...
2007-12-27 04:54:57 · update #1
hi im from britain, and here we have the data protection act which is basically the same as ur thing but over here we would definitely let members of family know the condition of a loved one and would tell them what there diagnosis was etc over the phone, however if the person enquiring was not a close family member then hospital staff would not be able to give any information on the patient. He was probably just angry because you would not tell him how his bro was, and we would over here.I hope this helps x
2007-12-26 14:11:10 · answer #1 · answered by Little Star 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
HIPAA as you and I know it is a prime example of what goes wrong when congress gets involved with healthcare.
It is a US only law. And if you can believe it, it started out as a law which would give patients better access to their medical records! LOL )-
2007-12-26 14:11:52 · answer #2 · answered by Butterfly Lover 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
They have their own privacy laws in England (Data Protection Act). It may be similar to HIPAA in some ways but it's not as strict.
2007-12-26 14:56:06 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋