I worked for two agencies caring for people with developmental disabilities. One of our clients that was cared for at job #1 left our agency and was being cared for by a different provider who I also worked for. He had an incident where he fell and he also choked on some food and staff did the heimlich maneuver on him. I told one of my co-workers at job #1 that knew the consumer from working with him previously about what happened to him. Job #1 fired me for it saying I violated hipaa. He wasn't job #1's consumer any longer. I am just wondering if this was a hipaa violation.

You are not "allowed" to discuss patients or what you learn about patients or the treatment they receive with ANYONE - yes, I think you violated HIPAA by repeating information off the job place.

The punishment, though, seems terribly harsh. HIPAA always confuses me because there can be such a fine line between ethical and unethical.

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Originally Posted by teddybear70

... I told one of my co-workers at job #1 that knew the consumer from working with him previously about what happened to him. ...

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You told someone at job #1 about what had happened at job #2? Yes, that would possibly be a violation. I don't know if there is an exception to the HIPAA regulations for one provider to tell medical information to another provider. In my opinion there should be so as to afford competent medical care. It would be ludicrous if one hand were prevented from knowing what the other was doing because of some ill-conceived notion of "privacy".

You have posted this in the criminal law forum. You do understand that a violation of the HIPAA regulations is only very rarely treated as a criminal violation?

It just seemed odd to me that Job #1 fired me for it when the man I was speaking of was not their consumer any longer. I would understand if Job #2 fired me for it because he is their consumer and I discussed it with the previous provider. Could this prevent me from working in the healthcare field in the future?

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Originally Posted by teddybear70

It just seemed odd to me that Job #1 fired me for it when the man I was speaking of was not their consumer any longer. I would understand if Job #2 fired me for it because he is their consumer and I discussed it with the previous provider. Could this prevent me from working in the healthcare field in the future?

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Yes, it is odd. It's really none of their business, but I suspect that they figured if you violated it in respect to the other employer, you might violate it with respect to them too.

In your future employment applications, you would have to say that you were fired.

I think they used the HIPAA violation as a smoke screen to get rid of you. Choking is not a medical records issue, anyone can choke sick or well. However they, #1, may not like the fact that you work for the competition and talk about what happens at their location. You could be an "At will employee" and if so they can let you go for no reason at all. If you want to spin their world seek a lawyer who does HIPAA work. Since they gave cause, really silly on their part, they can be forced to defend their actions and this could be determined to be wrongful termination.

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Originally Posted by ballengerb1

... Choking is not a medical records issue, anyone can choke sick or well. ...

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However for "agencies caring for people with developmental disabilities", I suspect that it would be such an issue.

I have pretty good nursing home knowledge AND people who work in "my" home (or group of homes) are not allowed to discuss any aspect of patient care with anyone other than the patient/care giver.

I wonder "here" if the employer who did the firing is concerned about legal action, legal ramifications, or just what they see to be a violation of privacy. My educated guess would be that nursing homes don't want info on falling and/or choking spread around.

That's the difficulty with abuse/neglect cases in nursing homes - trying to find a history.

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Originally Posted by teddybear70

It just seemed odd to me that Job #1 fired me for it when the man I was speaking of was not their consumer any longer.

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Doesn't seem odd to me. HIPAA says that a medical practitioner cannot discuss the diagnosis or treatment of any patient with a third party without permission. By discussing this other patient with your co-worker, you violated HIPAA. While this would probably not reflect poorly on Job #1, since you were revealing information that you learned as an employee of Job #2, it revealed a lack of discretion on your part. They may have felt if you were willing to discuss JOB #2's patient, what would you do with their patient's. I'm surprised they didn't report the incident to Job #2 and get you fired there.

However, the kicker here is what you discussed. Relating an incident where someone received the Heimlich maneuver during a meal, doesn't seem to be medical diagnosis and treatment. So it may just be that were looking for an excuse.

Yes in my opinion you violated the law. And no it does not sound wrong to be fired from job one, since you broke the rule, and if you did for one company, they can only assume you may for them also.

You can not tell friends, family, anyone about what happens in the homes of people that you visit. Telling job 1 about a ex patent is a direct violation

Well, the funny thing is that I didn't get fired from job #2 which is kind of weird because I would have figured they would fire me since the man I was referring to was being provided for by their agency. I was upfront with them and told them exactly what I had done and they said that it was a grey area and not cause for termination since I discussed it with someone who had previously worked with him and knew him. Job #1 was looking for a reason I believe. I didn't discuss any medical records. Just an incident report.

So be glad you keep one of the two jobs and move on