You indeed are entirely too anal about this thing. Sending a card is not a violation of HIPAA. Neither would it be if the 'bad employee' ran up and down the hall telling employees about somebody's illness if she happened to have that knowledge. There's a large difference in stupid behavior and illegal action on the part of the plan or the employer who is carrying out the plan. How much time did you actually spend printing out my answer and retyping it and inserting your bad employee as the speaker of those words? You have terribly and totally overestimated and misinterpreted HIPAA regulations. I hope you will go to the drugstore and pick out a nice card now to send your bad employee whom you have terribly misinformed. Something in the dollar-ninety-five range will do nicely.
Don and Frank, there is no simple answer here. If the ee spreading the rumor about another ee's illness happens to also represent the "plan", would you allow it? If the card said get well fine but according to the post, this ee was giving out the ee's illness. That is uncalled for. It would only be a HIPAA violation if this person represented the plan, I agree, but HIPAA is not the only regulation possibly being violated here. As Skyrocket pointed out earlier. It's not 99.9% of the ees that wouldn't care, it's that 0.1% that matters and ruins it for everyone. Have you ever heard the term "No Good Deed Goes Unpunished".
I'm going to move on; but Scott, you need to reread the original post carefully. It does not state that an employee is giving out an employee's confidential medical information. The implication was that if someone is circulating a get well card, then somebody must be ill. I think that's a reasonable conclusion but calls for no HIPAA knee-jerk. As you know, however, even if he/she were, the employer is not guilty of a HIPAA violation. As indicated earlier, there's illegal action and then there's stupidity or poor judgement on the part of an employee. An employer is under no obligation to police the latter, typically. We have enough 'real' laws to deal with without conjuring up 'imaginary' ones.
>Don and Frank, there is no simple answer here. If the ee spreading >the rumor about another ee's illness happens to also represent the >"plan", would you allow it? If the card said get well fine but >according to the post, this ee was giving out the ee's illness.
It IS simple.
1. HR initiates the card. 2. HR monitors what the card says. 3. HR sends out the card, with appropriate content.
An employee running around gabbing about another employee's illness is a different issue, and that issue should not be comingled. Apply your policies regarding gossip, etc. If you don't have any, get one. And if this gabbing employee "happens to represent the plan" you either terminate or transfer. That employee has no business being connected to HR.
Again, it is simple, but that doesn't make it easy - they don't go hand in hand. In this case, I think it is "easy" to view HIPAA as the Big Bad Wolf that has all this control over what you can do. I saw the same thing with Title IX, ADA, and FMLA, and I saw a lot of people paralyzed by their fear of doing something that might run afoul of those laws. I think that's a shame... it reduces the art of HR to a cold science and saps our ability to perform our greatest work - helping our employees be as productive as they can be.
Don, don't take things so personally. I meant no offense, but you respond with insults. As I go through life, I always try not to take things that seriously. I have never, here or anywhere else, presented myself as an authority on HIPAA. I asked about it in order to learn and tried to apply what I learned to a specific situation. Thanks for your input.
What I truly appreciate is that while the replies to the post occasionally pulled away from the original question, some of you were able to bring it back to a few simple points. That is part of our daily lives in HR, isn't it? We take in information, process it, attempt to bring clarity to the situation so it can be resolved.
It was also nice to see that while passions flared, everyone was able to communicate in the end. This is what we often help our employees do, and I'm glad we can handle ourselves this way as well.
Comments
>the rumor about another ee's illness happens to also represent the
>"plan", would you allow it? If the card said get well fine but
>according to the post, this ee was giving out the ee's illness.
It IS simple.
1. HR initiates the card.
2. HR monitors what the card says.
3. HR sends out the card, with appropriate content.
An employee running around gabbing about another employee's illness is a different issue, and that issue should not be comingled. Apply your policies regarding gossip, etc. If you don't have any, get one. And if this gabbing employee "happens to represent the plan" you either terminate or transfer. That employee has no business being connected to HR.
Again, it is simple, but that doesn't make it easy - they don't go hand in hand. In this case, I think it is "easy" to view HIPAA as the Big Bad Wolf that has all this control over what you can do. I saw the same thing with Title IX, ADA, and FMLA, and I saw a lot of people paralyzed by their fear of doing something that might run afoul of those laws. I think that's a shame... it reduces the art of HR to a cold science and saps our ability to perform our greatest work - helping our employees be as productive as they can be.
What I truly appreciate is that while the replies to the post occasionally pulled away from the original question, some of you were able to bring it back to a few simple points. That is part of our daily lives in HR, isn't it? We take in information, process it, attempt to bring clarity to the situation so it can be resolved.
It was also nice to see that while passions flared, everyone was able to communicate in the end. This is what we often help our employees do, and I'm glad we can handle ourselves this way as well.