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PRIVACY NOTICE
THIS NOTICE DESCRIBES HOW MEDICAL INFORMATION
ABOUT YOU MAY BE USED AND DISCLOSED AND HOW YOU CAN GET ACCESS TO THIS INFORMATION. PLEASE REVIEW IT CAREFULLY.
The St. Lucie County Fire District ("District")
is required by law to maintain the privacy of certain confidential health care
information, known as Protected Health Information or PHI, and to provide you
with a notice of our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to your
PHI. The District is also required to abide by the terms of the version of this
Notice currently in effect.
Use and Disclosures of PHI: The District may use PHI for the purposes of
treatment, payment, and health care operations, in most cases without your
written permission. Examples of our use of your PHI:
For Treatment.:
This includes such things as obtaining verbal and written information about your
medical condition and treatment from you as well as from others, such as doctors
and nurses who give orders to allow us to provide treatment to you. We may give
your PHI to other health care providers involved in your treatment, and may
transfer your PHI via radio or telephone to the hospital or dispatch center.
For Payment.: This
includes any activities we must undertake in order to get reimbursed for the
services we provide to you, including such things as submitting bills to
insurance companies, making medical necessity determinations and collecting
outstanding accounts.
For Health Care Operations:
This includes quality assurance activities, licensing, and training programs to
ensure that our personnel meet our standards of care and follow established
policies and procedures, as well as certain other management functions.
Use and Disclosure of PHI Without Your
Authorization. The
District is permitted to use PHI without your
written authorization, or opportunity to object, in certain situations, and
unless prohibited by a more stringent state law, including:
· For the treatment, payment
or health care operations activities of another health care provider who treats
you;
· For health care and legal
compliance activities;
· To a family member, other
relative, or close personal friend or other individual involved in your care if
we obtain your verbal agreement to do so or if we give you an opportunity to
object to such a disclosure and you do not raise an objection, and in certain
other circumstances where we are unable to obtain your agreement and believe the
disclosure is in your best interests;
· To a public health authority
in certain situations as required by law (such as to report abuse, neglect or
domestic violence);
· For health oversight
activities including audits or government investigations, inspections,
disciplinary proceedings, and other administrative or judicial actions
undertaken by the government (or their contractors) by law to oversee the health
care system;
· For judicial and
administrative proceedings as required by a court or administrative order, or in
some cases in response to a subpoena or other legal process;
· For law enforcement
activities in limited situations, such as when responding to a warrant;
· For military, national
defense and security and other special government functions;
· To avert a serious threat to
the health and safety of a person or the public at large;
· For workers' compensation
purposes, and in compliance with workers' compensation laws;
· To coroners, medical
examiners, and funeral directors for identifying a deceased person, determining
cause of death, or carrying on their duties as authorized by law;
· If you are an organ donor,
we may release health information to organizations that handle organ procurement
or organ, eye or tissue transplantation or to an organ donation bank, as
necessary to facilitate organ donation and transplantation;
· For research projects, but
this will be subject to strict oversight and approvals;
· We may also use or disclose
health information about you in a way that does not personally identify you or
reveal who you are.
Any other use or disclosure of PHI, other than those
listed above will only be made with your written authorization. You may revoke
your authorization at any time, in writing, except to the extent that we have
already used or disclosed medical information in reliance on that authorization.
Patient Rights: As
a patient, you have a number of rights with respect to your PHI, including:
The right to access, copy or inspect your PHI. This
means you may inspect and request a copy of the medical information about you
that we maintain. We will normally provide you with access to this information
in a timely fashion not to exceed 30 days of your request. In regard to PHI, the
St. Lucie County Fire District will abide by the law that provides the more
stringent protection of your health information. We may also charge you a
reasonable fee for copies of any medical information that you have the right to
access. In limited circumstances, we may deny you access to your medical
information, and you may appeal certain types of denials. We have available
forms to request access to your PHI and we will provide a written response if we
deny you access and let you know your appeal rights. You also have the right to
receive confidential communications of your PHI. If you wish to inspect and
request a copy of your medical information, you should contact our privacy
officer.
The right to amend your PHI. You
have the right to ask us to amend written medical information that we may have
about you. We will generally amend your information within 60 days of your
request and will notify you when we have amended the information. We are
permitted by law to deny your request to amend your medical information only in
certain circumstances, like when we believe the information you have asked us to
amend is correct. If you wish to request that we amend the medical information
that we have about you, you should contact our privacy officer.
The right to request an accounting. You
may request an accounting from us of certain disclosures of your medical
information that we have made in the six years prior to the date of your
request. We are not required to give you an accounting of the information we
have used or disclosed for purposes of treatment, payment or health care
operations, or when we share your health information with our business
associates, like our billing company or a medical facility from/to which we have
transported you. We are also not required to give you an accounting of our uses
of protected health information for which you have already given us written
authorization. If you wish to request an accounting, contact our privacy
officer.
The right to request that we restrict the uses and
disclosures of your PHI. You have the right to
request that we restrict how we use and disclose your medical information that
we have about you. The District is not required to agree to any restrictions you
request, but any restrictions agreed to by The District in writing are binding
on The District.
Internet, Electronic Mail, and the Right to Obtain
Copy of Paper Notice on Request. If we maintain
a web site, we will prominently post a copy of this Notice on our web site. If
you allow us, we will forward you this Notice by electronic mail instead of on
paper and you may always request a paper copy of the Notice.
Revisions to the Notice: The
District reserves the right to change the terms of this Notice at any time, and
the changes will be effective immediately and will apply to all protected health
information that we maintain. Any material changes to the Notice will be
promptly posted in our facilities and posted to our web site, if we maintain
one. You can get a copy of the latest version of this Notice by contacting our
privacy officer.
Your Legal Rights and Complaints: You
also have the right to complain to us, or to the Secretary of the United States
Department of Health and Human Services if you believe your privacy rights have
been violated. You will not be retaliated against in any way for filing a
complaint with us or to the government. Should you have any questions, comments
or complaints you may direct all inquiries to our privacy officer.
Privacy Officer Contact Information:
Kelly Machado
St. Lucie County Fire District
5160 NW Milner Drive
Port St. Lucie, Florida 34983
1-772-621-3344
www.slcfd.com |
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