HIPAA Guidelines

Please read this form which explains your privacy rights. Our policy establishes requirements for staff, patients and physicians regarding access to your private health information (PHI). Our office was designed from the ground up to be compliant with HIPAA regulations which were established in 2001 and multiple revisions have occurred since implementation in 2003 and 2005. Those authorized with access to your information are responsible for properly storing and restricting access to your information. Many providers will ask you to sign a waiver allowing us to disclose your information without risk of HIPAA penalties. We are attempting to follow all of the privacy rights you need without asking you to sign a waiver.  You do have to fill out this form though.  Misuse of your private health information will be regarded with the utmost seriousness. Any alleged violation should be reported to our security officer as soon as possible and an investigation will be made available to you or to a security auditor regarding any access of your health records. In our facility we use an electronic medical record. We scan in any paper documents AND YOUR DRIVERS LICENSE you might bring in and we backup that information and store it in another facility in case of emergency. We have methods to operate in emergency mode where your information is not available but also have mechanisms in place to migrate your archived information back to your medical record. In our office your studies will be performed without patient identifying information except for a internal coded identifier. This unique identifier is stored in your electronic medical record. Any access to your electronic medical record to locate this identifier can be audited and tracked. When you arrive at our office you will be given a card with your special identifier which can be used on future visits. Your PHI can be utilized for treatment, and this information can be shared with your insurance company and other health care providers for your treatment to progress. We do submit your health information to your insurance provider by electronic data exchange. By using the unique identifier in our office in most cases even if people physically break in to our offices they cannot identify which study belongs to which patient unless they also have passwords and access to our servers. We have a security audit each year to see if we are in compliance with HIPAA regulations. While you can elect to have no communication from our office. We will only accept you as a patient if we are able to call you in case we need to contact you. You may provide an alternate number or change your contact information at any time. This contact information is also protected in your electronic medical record.

If you feel your patient confidentiality has been compromised, you can contact our HIPAA custodian.  Currently this is Dr. Philip W. Chao.  He will try to help you determine who has accessed your records and should be able to tell you when and if any access to your information occured.