COMPLAINCE ASSURANCE NOTIFICATION FOR OUR PATIENTS

To Our Valued Patients:

The misuse of Personal Health Information (PHI) has been identified as a national problem causing patients inconvenience, aggravation, and money. We want you to know that all of our employees, managers and doctors continually undergo training so that they may understand and comply with government rules and regulations regarding the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) with particular emphasis on the “Privacy Rule.” We strive to achieve the very highest standards of ethics and integrity in performing services for our patients.

It is our policy to properly determine appropriate use of PHI in accordance with the governmental rules, laws and regulations. We want to ensure that our practice never contributes in any way to the growing problem of improper disclosure of PHI. We have implemented a Compliance Program that we believe will help us prevent any inappropriate use of PHI.

We also know that we are not perfect! Because of this fact, our policy is to listen to our employees and our patients without any thought of penalization if they feel that an event in any way compromises our policy of integrity. More so, we welcome your input regarding any service problem so that we may remedy the situation promptly.

REQUEST FOR MEDICAL RECORDS POLICY

Any patient has the right to request PHI in designated record sets (such as your medical record or billing record). All efforts will be made to handle each request in a timely matter. Due to patient load, privacy issues and obtaining accurate information, we will require at least 5 business days to process your request. All requests must be made in writing with specific items requested. All requested material will either be mailed to patients' home address or be held for patient pick up.

You are entitled to one disclosure accounting in any 12-month period at no charge.