1(903)455-4051

Privacy Policies

 

Web Privacy:

 

• Except as otherwise stated in this Privacy Policy, we do not sell, trade, rent or otherwise share for marketing purposes your Personal Information with third parties without your consent. In general, the Personal Information you provide to us is used to help us communicate with you.  For example, we use Personal Information to contact users in response to questions, solicit feedback from users, provide technical support, and inform users about services provided.

 

• Links to Third Party Sites:  We provide links to third party sites. Because we do not control those Web sites, we encourage you to review the privacy policies posted on these third party sites. That another web site is linked to our site does not constitute an endorsement by Pathology Associates of the owner of the other site, the content of its site, or its products or services.
   

• Questions:  Pathology Associates welcomes comments and questions on this policy. We are dedicated to protecting your personal information, and will make every reasonable effort to keep that information secure. If you have any questions, please contact us at ebrmo@geusnet.com.  Due to the rapidly evolving technologies on the Internet, we may occasionally update this policy. All revisions will be posted to this site. The revised Privacy Policy will apply to all data collected by Pathology Associates, both prior to and subsequent to the Revised Policy’s effective date.

 

 

HIPPAA Joint Privacy Notice:

 

This joint notice describes how medical information about you may be used and disclosed, and how you may get access to this information.  We understand that your medical information is private and confidential.  Further, we are required by law to maintain the privacy of "protected health information" or PHI.  PHI includes any individually identifiable information that we obtain from you or others that relates to your past, present or future physical or mental health, the health care you have received, or payment for your health care.  We will share protected health information with one another, as necessary, to carry out treatment, payment or health care operations relating to the services to be rendered at the laboratory or hospital affiliates.

 

As required by law, this notice provides you with information about your rights and our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to the privacy of PHI.  This notice also discusses the uses and disclosures we will make of your PHI.  We must comply with the provisions of this notice as currently in effect, although we reserve the right to change the terms of this notice from time to time and to make the revised notice effective for all PHI we maintain.

 

PERMITTED USES AND DISCLOSURES

We can use or disclose your PHI for purposes of treatment, payment and health care operations.  For each of these categories of uses and disclosures, we have provided a description and an example below.  However, not every particular use or disclosure in every category will be listed.

• Treatment means the provision, coordination or management of your health care, including consultations between health care providers relating to your care and referrals for health care from one health care provider to another.  For example, a physician pathologist reviewing your breast biopsy may need to review your radiology report or discuss your case with your radiologist or treating doctor in order to arrive at a correct diagnosis.

• Payment means the activities we undertake to obtain reimbursement for the health care provided to you, including billing, collections, claims management, determinations of eligibility and coverage and other utilization review activities.  For example, we may need to provide PHI to your Third Party Payor to determine whether the proposed course of treatment will be covered or if necessary to obtain payment.  Federal or state law may require us to obtain a written release from you prior to disclosing certain specially protected PHI for payment purposes, and we will ask you to sign a release when necessary under applicable law.

• Health care operations means the support functions of laboratory or hospital/clinic/surgery center affiliates, related to treatment and payment, such as quality assurance activities, receiving and responding to patient comments and complaints, physician reviews, compliance programs, audits, business planning, development, management and administrative activities.  For example, we may use your PHI to evaluate the performance of our staff when caring for you.  We may also combine PHI about many patients to decide what additional services we should offer, what services are not needed, and whether certain new diagnostic tests or ancillary studies are useful. We may also disclose PHI for review and learning purposes.  In addition, we may remove (i.e. de-identify) information that identifies you so that others can use the de-identified information to study health care and health care delivery without learning who you are.

 

OTHER USES AND DISCLOSURES OF PROTECTED HEALTH INFORMATION

We may also use your PHI in the following ways:

• To your family or friends or any other individual identified by you to the extent directly related to such person's involvement in your care or the payment for your care.

• We will allow your family and friends to act on your behalf to pick-up specimens, slides, tissue blocks, or printed reports upon receipt of appropriate release forms.

• If requested by your treating doctor or facility, we may use or disclose your PHI for research protocols, subject to the requirements of applicable law.  When required, we will obtain a written authorization from you prior to using your health information for research.

• We will use or disclose PHI about you when required to do so by applicable law.

• In accordance with applicable law, we may disclose your PHI to your employer if we are retained to conduct an evaluation relating to medical surveillance of your workplace or to evaluate whether you have a work-related illness or injury.  You will be notified of these disclosures by your employer or the laboratory as required by applicable law.

 

SPECIAL SITUATIONS

Subject to the requirements of applicable law, we will make the following uses and disclosures of your PHI:

• Organ and Tissue Donation.  If you are an organ donor, we may release PHI to organizations that handle organ procurement or transplantation as necessary to facilitate organ or tissue donation and transplantation.

• Military and Veterans.  If you are a member of the Armed Forces, we may release PHI about you as required by military command authorities.  We may also release PHI about foreign military personnel to the appropriate foreign military authority.

• Worker's Compensation.  We may release PHI about you for programs that provide benefits for work-related injuries or illnesses.

• Public Health Activities.  We may disclose PHI about you for public health activities, including disclosures:

• to prevent or control disease, injury or disability;

• to report births and deaths;

• to report child abuse or neglect;

• to persons subject to the jurisdiction of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for activities related to the quality, safety, or effectiveness of FDA-regulated products or services and to report reactions to medications or problems with products;

• to notify a person who may have been exposed to a disease or may be at risk for contracting or spreading a disease or condition.

• Health Oversight Activities.  We may disclose PHI to federal or state agencies that oversee our activities (e.g., providing health care, seeking payment, and civil rights).

• Lawsuits and Disputes.  If you are involved in a lawsuit or a dispute, we may disclose PHI subject to certain limitations.

• Law Enforcement.  We may release PHI if asked to do so by a law enforcement official:

• In response to a court order, warrant, summons or similar process.

• Coroners, Medical Examiners and Funeral Directors.  We may release PHI to a coroner or medical examiner.  We may also release PHI about patients to funeral directors as necessary to carry out their duties.

• National Security and Intelligence Activities.  We may release PHI about you to authorized federal officials for intelligence, counterintelligence, other national security activities authorized by law or to authorized federal officials so they may provide protection to the President or foreign heads of state.

• Inmates.  If you are an inmate of a correctional institution or under the custody of a law enforcement official, we may release PHI about you to the correctional institution or law enforcement official.  This release would be necessary (1) to provide you with health care; (2) to protect your health and safety or the health and safety of others; or (3) for the safety and security of the correctional institution.

Note:  HIV‑related information, genetic information, alcohol and/or substance abuse records,  and other specially protected health information may enjoy certain special confidentiality protections under applicable state and federal law.  Any disclosures of these types of records will be subject to these special protections.

 

OTHER USES OF YOUR HEALTH INFORMATION

Other uses and disclosures of PHI not covered by this notice or the laws that apply to us will be made only with your written authorization.  You have the right to revoke that authorization at any time, provided that the revocation is in writing, except to the extent that we already have taken action in reliance on your authorization.

 

YOUR RIGHTS

1.  You have the right to request restrictions on our uses and disclosures of PHI for treatment, payment and health care operations.  However, we are not required to agree to your request unless the disclosure is to a health plan in order to receive payment, the PHI pertains solely to your health care items or services for which you have paid the bill in full, and the disclosure is not otherwise required by law.  To request a restriction, you must make your request in writing to R. Irvin Morgan, M.D. Pathology Associates, 4818 Wellington Street, Suite 4, Greenville, TX 75402, Compliance Officer (Carol West), (903) 455-4051.

 

2.  You have the right to inspect and copy the PHI contained in our laboratory records, except:

(i) for information compiled in reasonable anticipation of, or for use in, a civil, criminal, or administrative action or proceeding;
(ii) for PHI involving laboratory tests when your access is restricted by law;
(iii) if you are a prison inmate, and access would jeopardize your health, safety, security, custody, or rehabilitation or that of other inmates, any officer, employee, or other person at the correctional institution or person responsible for transporting you;

In order to inspect or obtain a copy your PHI, you must submit your request in writing to R. Irvin Morgan, M.D. Pathology Associates, 4818 Wellington Street, Suite 4, Greenville, TX 75402, Compliance Officer (Carol West), (903) 455-4051.

 

3. You have the right to request an amendment to your PHI but we may deny your request for amendment, if we determine that the PHI or record that is the subject of the request:

(i) was not created by us, unless you provide a reasonable basis to believe that the originator of PHI is no longer available to act on the requested amendment;
(ii) is not part of your medical or billing records or other records used to make decisions about you;
(iii) is not available for inspection as set forth above; or
(iv) is accurate and complete.

In any event, any agreed upon amendment will be included as an addition to, and not a replacement of, already existing records.  In order to request an amendment to your PHI, you must submit your request in writing to the Compliance Officer (Carol West) at R. Irvin Morgan, M.D. Pathology Associates Laboratory, 4818 Wellington Street, Suite 4, Greenville, TX 75402, along with a description of the reason for your request.

 

4.  You have the right to receive an accounting of disclosures of PHI made by us to individuals or entities other than to you for the six years prior to your request, except for disclosures:

(i) to carry out treatment, payment and health care operations as provided above;
(ii) incidental to a use or disclosure otherwise permitted or required by applicable law;
(iii) pursuant to your written authorization;
(iv) for the treating hospital or facilities directory or to persons involved in your care or for other notification purposes as provided by law;
(v) for national security or intelligence purposes as provided by law;
(vi) to correctional institutions or law enforcement officials as provided by law;
(vii) as part of a limited data set as provided by law.

To request an accounting of disclosures of your PHI, you must submit your request in writing to our Compliance Officer (Carol West) at R. Irvin Morgan, M.D. Pathology Associates Laboratory, 4818 Wellington Street, Suite 4, Greenville, TX 75402.  Your request must state a specific time period for the accounting (e.g., the past three months).

6.  You have the right to receive a notification, in the event that there is a breach of your unsecured PHI, which requires notification under the Privacy Rule.

 

COMPLAINTS

If you believe that your privacy rights have been violated, you should immediately contact our Compliance Officer (Carol West) at (903) 455-4051 at Pathology Associates Laboratory.  We will not take action against you for filing a complaint.  You also may file a complaint with the Secretary of the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services.

 

CONTACT PERSON

If you have any questions or would like further information about this notice, please contact our Compliance Officer (Carol West) at (903) 455-4051.

 

This notice is effective as of March 1, 2015.