This is a kind of "extra edition" of FootZine, and without many of the usual features.  Ray Posa forwarded to me a press release that we thought you all would want to be aware of.  It is the HIPAA feature this week, preceded by a note from Ray. 

Add in another source for AmeriGel and a couple of "Position Available" notices, and we've about filled the page.

~  Gayle

From:  Lou Lerz, Moore Medical Corporation
re:      AmeriGel Availability

Gayle,

Please let Jenny Gilliland know that as of next week [week of 4-21-2003] Moore Medical will be carrying the AmeriGel products.
Thanks

Lou Lurz
Sr. Sales Manager, Podiatry Market
Moore Medical Corporation
Office: 800-234-1464
Email: llurz@mooremedical.com

Looking for self motivated office staff.  Large Corporation needs medical assistant for the Melrose Park, Illinois, area.  Must be bilingual.  Experience is a plus.  Please fax resume to 815-464-7059.

*_*    *_*    *_*

Looking for staff for two positions, part-time front office and part-time back office assistant.  Busy, fun office with doctors that understand the importance of teamwork and greatly value their assistants.  Office located in Howell, New Jersey. 
Fax resume to (732) 886-8105,  Attention: Hal Ornstein, DPM

Hello Gayle,

Janlori Goldman forwarded this to me.  This is just the
kind of thing we warn doctors about, that it is the patients who will do the
enforcement and that they are being encouraged to do it.  The scary part is, just think how confused most offices are about the HIPAA laws and they are required to be knowledgeable about the rules and regulations.  Now imagine the general public, who know very little or, worse yet, think they do know their "new" rights, and they are going to be filing complaints left and right.

Just another reminder that practices need to keep cross their "T"s and dot
their "I"s.

Thanks
Ray

 For immediate release
 PRESS RELEASE
 Tuesday, April 8, 2003
 
 
HEALTH PRIVACY PROJECT LAUNCHES
 PRIVACY COMPLAINT MONITORING INITIATIVE
 
 HPP to monitor HHS enforcement of New Medical Privacy Law
 
 Today the Health Privacy Project (HPP) announces the launch of its HIPAA
 privacy complaint monitoring initiative. With this initiative HPP will
 monitor the oversight and enforcement of the HIPAA privacy rule by the
 Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights (OCR),
 to ensure that patients' privacy rights are enforced effectively. HPP
 has posted a model complaint form
 <http://www.healthprivacy.org/usr_doc/Final_Complaint_Form.pdf on its
 website and is asking the public to provide HPP with copies of
 complaints submitted to OCR. OCR has yet to post an online complaint
 form, even though most health care providers and health plans are
 required to comply with the new privacy law by April 14, 2003.
 
 Under the rule, individuals do not have a private right to action.
 Instead, the law provides that individuals must direct their complaints
 to HHS' Office for Civil Rights. HHS has the authority to impose civil
 and criminal penalties if covered entities are determined to be in
 violation of HIPAA. HHS officials have said that enforcement would
 largely be driven by complaints and that "voluntary compliance is the
 most effective way to [protect personal health information]," signaling
 to many in the health care industry that HHS does not intend to
 vigorously enforce the law. HPP will track the number and types of
 complaints and will monitor how effectively the Office of Civil Rights
 investigates and resolves complaints.
 
 "We want to ensure that patient's rights will be safeguarded and that
 the Office for Civil Rights lives up to its responsibility to enforce
 the HIPAA privacy rule vigorously. Given that HIPAA does not give
 people the right to sue, individuals must rely on the Bush
 administration to represent their interests," said Janlori Goldman,
 Director of the Health Privacy Project. "Our monitoring initiative is
 intended to ensure that consumers' voices are heard."
 
 The HIPAA privacy rule - the first major federal law to protect the
 privacy of peoples' medical records-- grants consumers a number of
 significant new rights, although in less sweeping form than most patient
 advocates pressed for. Among other changes, as of April 14:
 * people will receive a "notice of information
 practices" from their providers and plans explaining their new rights
 and how their information will be used;
 * patients must be given access to their medical
 records upon request;
 * health care providers and plans are barred from
 disclosing identifiable health information to employers;
 * psychotherapy notes are given special, heightened
 protections before they can be shared with providers;
 * hospitals must give patients the chance to opt-out
 of having both their name and health status publicly available in the
 hospital's directory; and
 * law enforcement must present some form of legal
 process before they can obtain access to health information.
 
 * * *
The Health Privacy Project is a non-partisan non-profit 501 c 3
 organization dedicated to protecting privacy in the health care arena,
 with the goal of promoting increased access to care and improved quality
 of care. The Project also staffs the Consumer Coalition for Health
 Privacy, a diverse network of over 100 consumer, disability rights,
 patient, labor and health care provider organizations engaged in the
 national and local debate on health privacy.
 
 As of April 14, 2003, most health care providers, hospitals, health
 plans and their business associates must be in compliance with the HIPAA
 medical privacy regulations (http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/hipaa/privacy.html).
 The law, which was finalized at the end of the Clinton administration
 and allowed to go into effect nearly two years ago by President Bush,
 will have a major impact on both consumers as well as health care
 organizations.
 
 New federal privacy rights will be available to health care consumers;
 although in less sweeping form than most patient advocates pressed for;
 and providers and health plans will have to adopt a set of rules and
 safeguards that promise to bring a large measure of uniformity,
 predictability; as well as short term burden ; to the collection and use
 of patients' medical information. Although it remains to be seen
 whether and how vigorously HHS' Office for Civil Rights will oversee and
 enforce the privacy regulation, there is no doubt that after April 14,
 certain key changes should be visible and in place.
 
 Those changes include:
 
 * Anyone entering a doctor's office, hospital, or
 applying to a health plan for benefits must be given a "Notice of
 Information Practices" that states the new rights mandated by the law,
 and explains how the "covered entity" intends to use and disclose the
 individual's health information. The regulation requires that a good
 faith effort be made to get people to acknowledge they have received the
 notice by signing it. The signing of the notice - a requirement put in
 place after the Bush administration removed the consent requirement from
 the Clinton version - is intended to increase the likelihood that people
 will actually receive and read the notice. It would be a good idea for
 the health care industry to post these notices on a Web site so that
 consumers could review them in advance.
 
 * People must be given access to their medical
 records. Although most states grant people this right, state laws are
 inconsistent and not well-enforced. The federal law requires that
 people be able to see, copy and supplement their records. Health care
 organizations must comply with the request within 30 days, and a
 reasonable fee may be charged. The new access rule may spur health care
 organizations to develop secure systems for people to access their
 records online, saving time and money for all involved.
 
 * Health care providers and plans will be barred
 from disclosing identifiable health information to employers. Also,
 employers acting in their capacity as health plans or providers (in the
 context of a self-insured company, for instance) are directly covered by
 the rules. However, because employers are not directly covered by the
 rule when not wearing the hat of a covered health plan or provider,
 information they collect as part of an Employee Assistance Program, or
 through a pre- or post-employment physical, is outside the scope of the
 privacy law.
 
 * Psychotherapy notes will be given special,
 heightened protections, and mental health providers will be able to
 refuse to disclose their notes to health plans without first obtaining a
 patient's voluntary authorization. Health plans may not condition the
 delivery of benefits or enrollment on obtaining authorization from an
 individual.
 
 * Hospitals must give patients the chance to opt-out
 of both having their name and health status publicly available in the
 hospital's directory, as well as allowing patients to limit the hospital
 from sharing medical information with family members. The presumption
 continues to be that certain limited information about hospital patients
 will be shared with the public and family members, but people will now
 have the right to bar those disclosures.
 
 * In most cases, law enforcement officials will have
 to present some form of legal process (warrant, subpoena or summons)
 before a covered entity can disclose protected health information to
 them. This new requirement fills a void where no such federal safeguard
 existed before. But virtually all health care stakeholders argued for
 tougher limits on law enforcement's access to medical records.
 
 * Medical information must be more securely
 collected, shared and stored by health care providers, plans and
 information clearinghouses, which must put in place appropriately scaled
 technical and administrative safeguards.
 
 * HHS' Office for Civil Rights will receive
 complaints from individuals who believe their rights under the
 regulation have been violated. HHS has the authority to impose civil
 and criminal penalties if covered entities are determined to be in
 violation of HIPAA. HHS officials recently have said that they believe
 "voluntary compliance" with the law is ideal, signaling to many in the
 health care industry that HHS does not intend to vigorously enforce the
 law. Given that HIPAA does not give people the right to sue, individuals
 must rely on the Bush administration to represent their interests.
 
 * State laws that are more stringent than the
 privacy regulation will continue to stand. However, just this week HHS
 announced it would review requests from state officials to allow certain
 state laws that are "contrary" to the regulation to remain in place,
 where the state can show that it is impossible to implement both the
 state and federal law.
 
 * The regulation includes a much wider range of
 responsibilities for covered entities to follow, such as designating a
 privacy officer and training employees to adhere to the rule.
 
 One of the major shortcomings of the privacy rule is still that the
 marketing of health-related products and services is legal, without any
 notice to consumers that the letters from their pharmacy may be an
 advertisement paid for by a drug company, and with no right for
 consumers to opt-out of getting these ads.
 
 HIPAA privacy: Myths vs. reality
 
 Even after a 24-month implementation phase, misinformation and confusion
 about some of the rule's core provisions abound. For instance, some
 doctors and hospital officials claim that the privacy regulation
 prohibits providers from communicating with patients by e-mail. The
 truth is that the regulation anticipates-and truly encourages-e-mail
 between practitioners and patients, provided a secure network is used
 and the messages are encrypted. In fact, the rule expressly allows
 patients to request "alternative means" of communicating.
 
 Other voices maintain that hospitals will be barred from giving out
 patient information to the public, thus keeping friends and family from
 reaching their loved ones. Again, the regulation established the
 opposite legal presumption. The hospital may continue to share
 information about patients (both location and health status, as well as
 more detailed information with family), unless the patient has
 specifically asked that such information not be shared.
 
 Similar misreadings appear to be common and include such myths as "the
 privacy rule will impede efforts to prevent and respond to a
 bioterrorist attack,"-legal scholars and authors of the regulation have
 concluded otherwise; and "clinical research will be jeopardized because
 covered entities will be reluctant to share data." Nothing in the rule
 supports such skittishness, and HHS should issue guidance reassuring the
 research community and covered entities.
 
 HHS Initiatives Needed
 
 A number of initiatives must get underway immediately to ensure that the
 regulation is put in place, without being unnecessarily over- or under-
 interpreted. First, HHS must play a more aggressive role in publishing
 guidance, responding to questions and publishing clarifications to
 HIPAA. They should make all of this available online. HHS also must
 reach out to health care organizations and consumers to publicize the
 scope of the law and offer technical assistance on implementation. And,
 HHS must be vigilant in overseeing, monitoring and enforcing the rule.
 Complaints should be made publicly available, investigated and resolved.
 The only way to eventually achieve significant voluntary compliance is
 for HHS to insist; through its own actions; that full compliance is
 expected, and that failure to do so will have true consequences.
 
For more information, contact:
 Janlori Goldman, Director
 Health Privacy Project
 202-721 5632
 http://www.healthprivacy.org


The above notice was provided by Raymond F. Posa, MBA
Technology Advisor to the American Academy of Podiatric Practice Management
President, R. Francis Associates

Any questions or comments can be addressed to Mr. Posa by E-mail:
Rposa@Rfrancis.com
You can review previous installments from Mr. Posa at
http://www.footzine.com/FZ_H.htm

Last Saturday, April 19th, several members of the Washington State Podiatric Medical Association, a few podiatric assistants, and many "podiatry family" members attended a press event at Seattle's Green Lake.  Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels accepted the award to the city from APMA and Prevention magazine as one of the "Top Ten Best Cities for Walking in America".  In addition to the presentation by Dr. Cherie Johnson, there were brief speeches by members of the Mayor's Pedestrian Advisory Council and by a representative of "Feet First", a pedestrian advocacy group.  All involved were pleased with the significant media coverage of the event.  For a look at some images from that event, have a look at the FootZine "Picture Pages":   http://www.footzine.com/FZ_8.htm

Next week should be back to "normal", so feel free to write!

~  Gayle