Legal and Ethical Considerations in Healthcare

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Table of Contents

Defining the problem: Confidentiality Breach
Compliance officer’s desirable course of actions
Incompliance to regulations vs. a legal concern
Defining each mistake: what should have been handled differently
Preventing the problem from reoccurring: a plan
The Leadership Role of the HIIM: Maintaining Compliance Behavior
Improving Clinical Documentation: A Plan
Reference List

Defining the problem: Confidentiality Breach

It is obvious that what has occurred can be defined as the breach of the patient’s confidentiality and the violation of the patient’s civil rights.

Compliance officer’s desirable course of actions

According to the existing HIPPAA (Protected health information and patient privacy, 2014) rules, a compliance officer is supposed to take the actions required to prevent the further leakage of any personal data of the patient.

Incompliance to regulations vs. a legal concern

At the first sight, the problem in question can be interpreted as a sign of poor coordination between the actions of the hospital staff. Hence, it can be interpreted as in compliance with the existing rules. The issue, however, can also be viewed from the perspective of the patient’s civil rights’ violation. Private information disclosure is a punishable offense, and the patient has the right to sue the hospital staff, which was exactly the case with Mr. Stevens. While one could make a very slim argument that the effects of the nurse’s actions were not as drastic as they could have been in the worst-case scenario – after all, none of the people involved got injured – yet the harm was done, and Mr. Stevens is most likely to win the case in court.

Hence, it will be reasonable to state that, when viewed from the perspective of the hospital staff, the problem can be seen as in compliance with regulations; however, when analyzed from the position of the patient, it takes the shape of legal concern.

Defining each mistake: what should have been handled differently

Spotting the step that has led to the drastic effects is not that hard – unless the nurse had confused the phone numbers, the situation would not exist. However, laying the blame on the nurse entirely would also be quite an overstatement; in fact, the case in point is a graphic example of an extremely poor knowledge management system employed at the hospital.

The case description shows clearly that the problems started at the point when the nurse decided to handle the patient’s personal information without consulting him. Despite the fact that the case opens with the description of a rather unpleasant conversation between Sue and the nurse, one must admit that the irritation, which the nurse experienced, as well as the manner, in which she talked to Sue, stemmed from the improper ethical principles, which the hospital staff was guided by. Consequently, the next step that was mishandled was failing to resolve the conflict between the patient and the hospital staff. Passing the responsibilities to Sue was the next step that should have been handled in a different manner – instead, Sue should have been able to monitor the communication between the patients and the staff and spot the problem on her own. Thus, a minor dent in the hospital’s ethics started snowballing, finally leading to a lawsuit.

Preventing the problem from reoccurring: a plan

To prevent further instances of this kind, the hospital management must carry out the following steps:

Reconsideration of the hospital ethics;
Improvement of the information management among the staff;
Introduction of new media as the key tool in hands-off communication among the nurses;
Enhancement of the patients’ personal data security.

Changes in the workflow

Apart from the aforementioned changes, it will be necessary that the confirmation of receiving notifications of orders, completing the ordered procedures or tests, etc., should be provided. While such a step presupposes increasing the amount of paperwork, it will also enhance security considerably (Unertl, Johnson & Lorenzi, 2012).

The Leadership Role of the HIIM: Maintaining Compliance Behavior

As a leader, an HIIM specialist is supposed to make sure that the existing rules are followed closely. Thus, not only the patients’ personal data security will be safe, but also the enhancement of the key processes in the healthcare facility will be possible.

Consent and release of information

An HIIM specialist is also supposed to take the consent and release information into account. It is crucial that an HIIM specialist make sure whether the patient has agreed to inform their family members or any people concerned, or whether the patient has decided to keep their information secret (Judkins-Cohn, Kielwasser-Withrow, Owen & Ward, 2014).

Improving Clinical Documentation: A Plan

To make the clinical documentation more ordered, it will be necessary to introduce new tools for information management. There is no need to stress that in the present-day world, information technologies have become a crucial tool in arranging the knowledge management process. Therefore, it is reasonable to suggest that in such a large healthcare system like the one in which Sue is employed, the latest information technologies should be employed in order to facilitate information security. For example, it will be a good idea to design a password-protected database, which only the staff could have access to. In addition, new media should be introduced into the hands-off communication process between the nursing specialists, so that the misunderstandings like the one that Sue has to deal with could not occur and that patients’ personal information should not leak. In addition, it will be required that every single activity related to transferring the patient’s personal information by any of the healthcare staff should be carried out only after receiving the patient’s informed consent.

Reference List

Judkins-Cohn, T. M., Kielwasser-Withrow, K., Owen, M. & Ward, J. (2014). Ethical principles of informed consent: Exploring nurses’ dual role of care provider and researcher.The Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing, 45(1), 35–42. Web.

Protected health information and patient privacy (2014). Web.

Unertl, K. M., Johnson, K. B. & Lorenzi, N. M. (2012). Health information exchange technology on the front lines of healthcare: workflow factors and patterns of use. Journal of the American Medical informatics Association, 19, 392-400. Web.

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