Posted 12:30PM EST, May 27, 2008
Fundraising and patient privacy rights
Many health care providers use patient records to send fundraising appeals to patients. Often times the permission is in the forms a patient signs when getting care. An article in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle discusses fundraising and privacy, revealing that a number of patients are upset about the practice.
Categories:
Healthcare Industry, Privacy
Grateful patient programs and fundraising practices by health care organizations are drawing fire from patients themselves and from some within the healthcare industry. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the mechanics of the practice and how some are responding to it.
The article makes it clear that the practice is allowed under federal law - patients give consent when signing registration forms - though privacy advocates lament this method. The report offers up California facilities that solicit patients directly for fundraising purposes and some that don't.
Several upset patients are quoted in the article and the comments feature additional ire and surprise at medical records being used in a way many seemed to be previously unaware of.
Source: San Francisco Chronicle.
The article makes it clear that the practice is allowed under federal law - patients give consent when signing registration forms - though privacy advocates lament this method. The report offers up California facilities that solicit patients directly for fundraising purposes and some that don't.
Several upset patients are quoted in the article and the comments feature additional ire and surprise at medical records being used in a way many seemed to be previously unaware of.
Source: San Francisco Chronicle.
