my wife had an operation at a local hospital, she works for a privet company which has dealings with the militery. someone from the hospital called my wifes job, and left on another employees machine privet info concerning my wifes operation procedures on this employees answering machine. now others at my wifes job may know of her operation procedure and info. when my wife called the hospital to complain, the lady who left the info on the other employees procedure machine simply said she was sorry but she must have hit the wrong extension. is this a hippa violation???

J_9

Yes, this is a HIPAA violation. Her surgery or medical condition cannot be discussed with anyone other than caregivers, doctors, nurses, etc...or anyone that she gives the healthcare providers permission to discuss her condition with.

If she did not give permission for this person at her company to have her information released, this individual did violate HIPAA policy.

Fr_Chuck

I will say that first who was she trying to get hold of ?? someone from the companies HR to do insurance filing ? Did she give permission for them to notify someone at the work place. ??

What type of info did they give ?

while I agree on the surface it sounds like it, I would say alto of details are not known.

LearningAsIGo

This is without a doubt, a violation of HIPAA. Under NO circumstances are messages of a delicate nature to be left on ANYONES machine, since you cannot be certain you have called the right person... or who may hear an answering machine recording.

Healthcare workers do have to leave messages on occasion. They should be nothing more than (example)
Mr. Jones this is Sandy with Dr. Doe's office. Please call me back at your earliest convinience.

Its possible your wifes employeer has a right to access some of her information, but only if her surgery was work related. Otherwise, its none of their business. Ask her doctor/hospital to review her consent forms and find out exactly who's name is on them before you pursue this to make sure your wife didn't sign anything giving consent to people you may not be aware of. (This happens frequently between couples in our medical office)