HI235 Legal Aspects of Health Information
Unit 3 Assignment
Medical Breach
What is a medical breach? A medical breach is when private health
information (PHI) is accessed without probable cause. When accessing PHI, there
should be valid reasons when obtaining information. There was a medical breach
involving George Clooney when he was admitted to the hospital to be treated for
an injury. There were allegedly doctors, employees, nurses placed on suspension
for having a medical breach. Employees having a “no need” to access should not
be accessing a patient's medical records. The hospital failed to provide Mr.
Clooney by maintaining his privacy due to improperly accessing his medical
records. The duty of care was not provided by the healthcare facility because of
shared PHI among social media. This was PHI that was publicly announced. They
said, “security guard released information about Clooney's family member's
phone number.”
Did this cause a causation for Mr. Clooney? Yes, the causation of this
breach was that Mr. Clooney PHI was known to everyone outside of his party. He
did not give any authorization for anyone to gain access to his information that