Tom, Are your remarks here concerned only about *privacy* laws with respect to EHR... i.e., patient and provider rights with respect to access and disclosure? I can't think of any other general aspect of law that would apply to EHR... at least not one that would benefit from the "uniform model code" that you describe.
In the US, the conflict and overlap between state laws and HIPAA is actually part of the motivation for writing the HIPAA Privacy Rule. It is expected the state laws will be eventually become aligned with and "modeled" after HIPAA in the privacy area, although there is no mechanism to ensure that. Incidentally, there are also areas of state-federal conflict like "prompt pay" laws, with respect to the HIPAA Transaction Rule... with no help in sight. Personally, I don't think legislatures should be making ANY rules that are specifically about electronic records and information sharing... at least, not until we have some sort of information authority or technical review board to pass these proposals by. Well-meaning politicians have written the Transaction Rule with the intent of helping patients and providers. But the ill-conceived rule ends up increasing everyone's cost and helping no one. -Chris At 06:11 PM 8/26/2003 -0700, lakewood at copper.net wrote: >Hi Bill, > >Thanks for the post. I did intend to use HIPAA as an example of a >legislative act that is poorly written without the assistance of a uniform >model code. It was enacted to keep the payers happy and not the Patients. > >Poor results occur when things are not grounded on solid fundamentals. >There is a Uniform Commercial Code that has evolved over many years and >has been modified and improved over these years. It has been adopted in >whole by many states and modified by others. The 51+ jurisdictions are >sufficiently different to cause one to look for an attorney to resolve >specific problems. > >Patients do not have the same rights as Patients in the UK or other EU >countries within the US. TheHIPAA Privacy Rule should have 'required' >consent initially and finally. It doesn't! It is a problem that has to be >fixed or a work-around developed and enacted as a modification or a new law. > >BTW: Findlaw is used as a reference, however bad, for the current state of >the interpreted law within the US. > >Your response is right on and should illustrate the need for a Uniform >Model Code for ElHRs especially since this scenario will be repeated in >many countries across the globe. > >If the US can have national and international model codes for Commerce it >should have the same for Healthcare and EHRs. In essence the governments >need a guiding light lest they visit another one like HIPAA on the populace! > >-Thomas Clark > >Bill Walton wrote: > >>Thomas Clark wrote: >> >> >> >>>Hi All, >>> >>>The following link is to a FindLaw reference regarding what HIPAA means >>>to Patients: >>> >>> >>> >>http://articles.corporate.findlaw.com/articles/file/00081/002452/title/Subje >>ct/topic/Health%20Law_HIPAA/filename/healthlaw_1_335 >> >> >> >><soap box> >>This article contains an egregious error. >> >>Under the section headed "Patient Rights Obligations" the author states that >>"HHS had initially proposed allowing routine disclosures without advance >>patient consent for treatment, payment and administrative operations, but >>the final rule requires informed patient consent for even these routine >>disclosures." >> >>This is not true. The final Privacy Rule *PERMITS* covered entities >>(providers, payers, clearinghouses) to obtain consent for use and >>disclosure of protected information in treatment, payment, and operations >>(there is some restriction in psychotherapy notes). It does NOT require >>consent for these uses. At best the author did not read the Preamble where >>this modification was clearly articulated to provide an option for those >>providers who were fearful of missteps and preferred to err on the side of >>caution. Unforunately I find it hard to give the author the benefit of the >>doubt and have written to the editors of FindLaw.com complaining about this >>article. HIPAA, like Y2K, has been the focus of far too many bottom feeding >>lawyers creating self-serving FUD among the US healthcare community. >> >>The US healthcare system has a bad enough rep without "help" like this. >></soap box> >> >>Best regards, >>Bill >> >>- >>If you have any questions about using this list, >>please send a message to d.lloyd at openehr.org >> >> > > > >- >If you have any questions about using this list, >please send a message to d.lloyd at openehr.org Christopher J. Feahr, O.D. Optiserv Consulting (Vision Industry) http://Optiserv.com http://VisionDataStandard.org Office (707) 579-4984 Cell (707) 529-2268 - If you have any questions about using this list, please send a message to d.lloyd at openehr.org
