Medical Confidentiality in a criminal case

[ffutures]

For a story I'm writing set in the USA various agents have determined that Doctor A has been sending an extremely dangerous drug to various third parties with terminal illnesses, suggesting that it might help them. There is no reason to believe that this is true, but the drug has occasionally produced spectacular results. One of the recipients and

Comments

[raktajinos]

Im not a doctor, but I am an almost-licensed paralegal in Canada (and as such I'm not an expert on US law, but I engage with enough bi-national issues on a daily basis that I feel okay about it). Hopefully someone else will comment who may have a more direct experience with this issue

[ffutures]

Thanks - this is more or less what I was hoping might be the case. It helps a lot.

[ladyamber]

Creds: Grew up surrounded by the medical field (sickly kid and Mom was a nurse/became a Physician's assistant), have also worked in a hospital and studied to become a medical biller and coder.

HIPAA, which is the main law governing things like confidentiality, doesn't apply to location. If you know a person, and you know where they are, you can state as such, at least as long as you know them as a friend. If you know it because of billing information, that's when it turns into a violation. Violating HIPAA would involve knowing the person has, say, tuberculosis, and disclosing that they have it, whether you actually participated in treating them or not

[ffutures]

Thanks - that helps a lot.

[akiko]

For ethics violations, the doctor could turn to the state medical licensing board. If it's a serious enough offense, they can pull his license. (Though this asshole is still practicing, so it really takes a LOT to get a license pulled. http://skepdic.com/buttar.html )

[ffutures]

That would take too long in the context of this story, and for various reasons wouldn't worry B anyway.

[corvideye]

Though I can't speak directly to your question, you might look into Jack Kevorkian (if you haven't already) for some additional food for thought on the ethical dilemmas when 'do no harm' conflicts with '(possibly) alleviate suffering'. At various times he was a fugitive, so there might be analogous situations with people who knew him and might be harboring him.

[ffutures]

The situation in the story is very similar, I think, thank you.

[arwensouth]

All right. One more time. I can't include the link because that makes LJ think it's spam, but here's what the official website has to say about addresses (and that they ARE protected information

[arwensouth]

p.s. A search on "hipaa de-identification guidance" should get you to a page at hhs dot gov that contains more detail...

[ffutures]

The situation here is a little different - they know who A is, they have ample evidence of crime, and Doctor B is not officially A's doctor.

More importantly, B is a doctor with a long history of bending the rules, and is concerned for A's safety. The situation is such that a speedy arrest might be the best outcome for A.