Read a selection of your colleagues’ postings.
Submit a different perspective concerning the medical social worker’s responsibilities your colleague shared.
Expand on your colleague’s description about safeguarding patient’s information by suggesting additional actions.
Refute or validate your colleague’s views about the ramifications HIPAA might have on social work practice in medical settings. Support your response with scholarly resources.
Case Scenario 1:
You are a medical social worker in an outpatient clinic at a major teaching hospital. A woman shows up at the clinic who claims she is one of your patient’s sisters. She states, “I am here to find out whether my brother George has been coming to his appointments. I am very worried because he is so sick and does not seem to be getting better. All I want to do is help him.” She goes on to say, “I don’t think he’s taking his medication. Can you tell me what meds he should be taking?”
DB 1
Nicole—
A brief description of a medical social workers responsibilities under HIPAA guidelines that apply to the case you selected.
Case scenario 1
You are a medical social worker in an outpatient clinic at a major teaching hospital. A woman shows up at the clinic who claims she is one of your patient’s sisters. She states “I am here to find out whether my brother George has been coming to his appointments. I am very worried because he is sick and does not seem to be getting better. All I want to do is help him.” She goes on to say, “I don’t think he’s taking his medication. Can you tell me?”
According to (NASW, 2005), under HIPAA guidelines any information the medical social worker obtains from the client (George) shall be viewed as confidential. Information may not be released without informed consent [standard 5].
Describe the rights of the person making the inquiry and explain how you as a social medical social worker should respond.
George’s sister has no rights without a release of informed consent. While I understand her concern, I would suggest she have this conversation with her brother about his medications and when and how he should be taking them. If George consents to me releasing information only then will I be able to share his history with her. Unfortunately, currently, I am not at liberty to share such information with her.
Describe the rights of the patient and the actions you might consider to safeguard your patient’s information.
The patient has a right to privacy, confidentiality, notices and authorizations and procedures for release of information (NASW, 2005 [standard 7]). Actions I may consider safeguarding my patient’s information by ensuring records are private confidential and in a secured location. Only accessed individuals and users will be able to see the files. Assigned username and passwords along with encryption will allow for confidential information (Harman et al., 2012).
Briefly describe your professional responsibilities to protect your patient.
My professional responsibilities are to ensure all information shared between me and my patient/clients are private and confidential unless informed consent authorizes me to release or verbalize information with third parties. It is my responsibility to familiarize myself with local, state, and federal mandates concerning HIPAA and such laws (NASW, 2005 [standard 5]). It is my duty and responsibility to have full understanding of the policies and procedures.
Harman, L. B., Flite, C. A., & Bond, K. (2012). Electronic health records: Privacy, confidentiality, and security, Virtual Mentor, 14(9), 712-719.
National Association of Social Workers (2005). NASW standards for clinical social work in social work practice. Retrieved from https://www.socialworkers.org
DB 2
Michael—
I am responding to Case Scenario 1:
In 1996 the U.S Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), implemented the Human Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) (Clinical social work association, n/d). HIPAA allows the social worker to disclose health care information to caretakers/family members or others involved in the clients health care in certain circumstances (HIPAA and Disclosure to Family Members or Others Involved in the Patient’s Care, n/d). The patient needs to sign proper releases of information (ROI) that discloses who the social worker can and cannot disclose information to, the patient is given the Notice of Privacy Practices (NPP) when admitted and should detail how the patients Protected Health Information (PHI) will be treated and under what conditions it will or will not be disclosed and to whom it can be disclosed to (Clinical social work association, n/d). If the patient is unable to consent then the social worker may disclose information as long as the social worker believes it is in the patients best interest and the social worker limits the information disclosed to only what is relevant to the patients care and wellbeing (Clinical social work association, n/d).
In scenario 1, the woman that comes in claims she is George’s sister, I will assume that George has not signed any consent forms and we have no proof that it is his sister. Even if it is his sister, he might not want her to be given private healthcare information. Some of the information that she is asking about, mainly what meds he is taking, is protected health information. I would not disclose if he is coming to his appointments, but I would let her know that at his next appointment I would address her concern about his medications. I would inform her that I am unable to give her that information due to HIPAA guidelines and that she needs to speak with George about giving us permission to give her information.
The information about whether or not he is coming to his appointments, I would feel is an ethical situation and in the code of ethics states in section 1.07 (Privacy and Confidentiality) “social workers should respect the right to privacy” (NASW, 2017). I feel that this is private information and does not need to be disclosed.
Clinical social work association. (n/d). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from https://www.clinicalsocialworkassociation.org/HIPA…
HIPAA and Disclosure to Family Members or Others Involved in the Patient’s Care. (n/d). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from https://www.hollandhart.com/showpublication.aspx?
National Association of Social Workers (NASW). (2017). Code of ethics. Retrieved from https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics/Code-of…
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