Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

One aspect of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is patient privacy rules. This has been an area of confusion for medical personnel over the years as to what constitutes a violation of the privacy rules.

Consider this scenario:

Jane obtains her prescriptions for genital herpes treatment from XYZ pharmacies. One store is in her area. One day she receives a mailing from a pharmaceutical company advertising their herpes treatment product. The mail has piled up with other pieces on the lobby of her apartment building, and her fellow tenants can easily see the description of the product and her name on the fliers.

In your first post:

Review the above scenario and describe what possible areas of HIPAA violations that might have occurred, and at what level (criminal, civil). Use peer reviewed literature to back up your position.

Who in this situation would be considered responsible for any violations?

What would be the consequences?