Need Current WTS Position re HIPAA

by Scully 8 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

Scully

Have there been any flashes of New Light™ since the September 1, 1987 Watchtower article "A Time To Speak" - When?
Specifically, I'm looking for any documentation (including but not limited to Body of Elder letters) that either restates or modifies the 1987 position regarding confidential client records (medical records especially).
Thanks in advance!
tula

I am going to follow this post, Scully, and thanks for posting it.
I read on a website awhile back about a JW who had gone to dr. and had vd. Another JW worked in dr. office and discovered clients complaint. As his loyalty to organization was above loyalty to law of land, he went to elders and reported the JW with vd.
Granted this is heresay, but I would sure like to know if this tattling behavior of confidential matters is expected and promoted.
fokyc

Scully,
UK members will not know exactly what you are about, as we don't have this in UK
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).
The Watchtower Org. and ALL the local elders are legally bound by ALL the local privacy laws!
BUT I have found, they have, in reality little regard for these Rules and Regulations, they act as they feel at the time so nothing is sacred to them.
NEVER trust the JW's is my understanding from over 55 years experience with them.
fokyc
fokyc

Watchtower 2002 6/15 p.31 A Time to Reveal a Confidential Matter
Keeping certain matters confidential can mean the difference between peace and contention. But is there a time to reveal a confidential matter? Note what the prophet Amos says about his God: "Jehovah will not do a thing unless he has revealed his confidential matter to his servants the prophets." (Amos 3:7) From these words, we can glean something concerning confidentiality. Jehovah may keep certain matters confidential for a period of time and eventually reveal them to some individuals. How can we imitate Jehovah in this regard?
At times, the appointed shepherds in the Christian congregation find it beneficial to keep a certain matter undisclosed. (Acts 20:28) For instance, with the benefit of the congregation in mind, they may decide to keep the details of some arrangements or changes in congregation responsibilities confidential until a specific time.
In such a case, however, it is important to make clear to those who are involved if, when, and in what manner the matter is to be revealed. Knowing when a matter will be publicly disclosed may help them to maintain confidentiality.—Proverbs 25:9.
This seems to only apply to congregational matters.
fokyc
purplesofa

I am not answering your question, but I felt a need to comment. I work in a hospitol and was looking over the HIPAA rules posted at our employee website. I wanted to copy and paste some things but was not allowed to.
We can have immediate termination for violations of HIPAA. There is no legit excuses. I cannot look at another employees transcriptions, I cannot look at a family members medical history without it being monitored. If my employee name/ID number matches same last name in medical records it is monitored and investigated.
Religion, morals, best friends, families, have no over ruling on this law. A patient's privacy is the number one priority. For anyone to break this code of conduct is inexcusable. I commend where I work for adhering to this policy.
For a society that is so worried about religious freedom, peace, human rights, they have no respect for a persons privacy in this matter.
When will they practice what the bible teaches, and that is what a person reaps they will sow and let God take care of matters as God sees fit.
The HIPAA rules are at best sometimes annoying, and people violate them unknowingly. What the Society condones is willfully breaking this law.
HIPAA is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. This act includes the Privacy and Security Rules/Standards. It was created to establish national standards to protect individual's medical records and other protected health information (PHI).
Under the HIPAA Privacy Rule (effective date April 14, 2003), patients have the right to inspect and copy their medical record, request an amendment to their medical record, request restrictions on to whom information may be disclosed, choose the means of confidential communication, receive copies of the Notice of Privacy Practices, request an accounting of non-routine disclosures and complain about privacy practices.
The HIPAA Security Rule (effective date April 20, 2005), specifies administrative, physical and technical measures required to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability of protected health information in electronic form.
purplesofa

I just had a further thought on this.
If HIPPA laws are violated to use medical records to DF someone from the organization. If the organization used that "stolen" information in a judicial situation, it would seem to me that the offended party would have rights to prosecute the organization if they so desired.
purps
Scully

I think this is why that 1987 Watchtower article stresses that breaching confidentiality "is a personal decision that [one] accepts before Jehovah."
In other words, if anyone gets sued, it's going to be the person breaching confidentiality and the elders who use that information to mete out congregational discipline. The WTS has effectively washed its hands of providing legal or financial assistance in the event of a lawsuit.
Oh and just to clarify, the WTS does not make decisions to DF people, it is the Judicial Committee at the local, congregation level making the decision.
Don't you just love it how the WTS has directives in place so precisely to keep themselves protected from lawsuits?

Mary

I couldn't find anything else in the literature, but I found this on the Society's website. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black:

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For Immediate Release
February 19, 2002

Outrage over prosecutor's conduct

MOSCOW—Fears for the future of religious freedom in Russia were expressed today by John Burns, a Canadian attorney, during a test case in a Moscow court to liquidate Jehovah's Witnesses.

"I am outraged that Tatyana Kondratyeva, the Moscow City prosecutor who brought this case, is roaming at will through confidential medical records, without the knowledge or consent of the patient or the patient's family, reading them out in court and even discussing them on national TV. Prosecutors like that are loose cannons, answerable to no one but themselves. They are a menace to the future of justice in Russia.

"As an attorney with 20 years' experience of litigation—mostly in medical cases—I have never witnessed such unabashed admission of the misuse of medical records. When our defence team protested, she declined to apologise, but just said, 'So sue me!' Well, she might be interested to know that we are now seriously considering doing just that."

The test case is being held in the Golovinsky Intermunicipal District Court, where last year the Witnesses won a two-year trial, during which, Mr Burns said, "Prosecution came close to being persecution. We have been put through seven years of criminal investigation and expensive trials that have failed to show any misconduct on the part of our 10,000 members here in Moscow.

"On top of that, the Moscow City court referred this case back to the same court with the prospect of a different decision. I fear for the future of law and justice in the new Russia if this Moscow prosecutor is allowed to get away with this grotesque parody."

The prosecution have said that they intend to use a verdict of liquidation on Moscow's Witnesses to close their 1,350 congregations throughout the Russian Federation. Human Rights observers fear that other minority faiths might later be targeted under the same legislation.

Some churches have already been closed, most notoriously the Salvation Army, but also the Evangelical Lutheran church, the New Generation church, and the Zion Protestant church.

Oxford's Keston Institute is warning about the implications of a new draft law to close some faiths, Geraldine Fagan reports. The new draft law was characterised by a Duma deputy as "ideological legislation, which shouldn't exist in principle."

The Golovinsky test case is expected to last a further two weeks.

Contacts:
Russian-speaking, Jaroslav Sivulskii, mobile phone: +7 902 682 8197
English-speaking, Paul Stevenson, mobile phone: +7 095 104 3750
Albert Polanski, mobile phone: +7 905 104 3688

Need Current WTS Position re HIPAA

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