Veterans Affairs to share medical info without consent.

SNOKING

Well-known member
Does this have any thing to do with the fact that the VA is moving in the direction on medical service from providers outside their own network/hospitals? If you go to the doctor down the street, doesn't he need to be able to see your pass health records? Chris
 
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JohnDar

Prolifically Gabby Member
Although not eligible for VA care, the ability to legitimately access a patients records outside the primary system is a good idea. Consider needing emergency care away from your primary care provider and you are not able to provide pertinent information on existing conditions and medications. Could make a major difference in the treatment you receive.


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GK2018

Well-known member
Although not eligible for VA care, the ability to legitimately access a patients records outside the primary system is a good idea. Consider needing emergency care away from your primary care provider and you are not able to provide pertinent information on existing conditions and medications. Could make a major difference in the treatment you receive.


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I don't like it because they are arbitrarily sharing it with other government agencies and third parties without my consent which I feel violates HIPPA. Plus all my medical information will be floating around in places I've never heard of with no way to bring that information back and consolidate it to one location and it cant be withdrawn once they do it. I feel like there are way too many red flags with this. There are so many data breaches nowadays and how do we/I know that these third parties will protect our information or how do I know these third parties arent going to sell our medical information for profit. I dont know anything about these companies and I dont have the time to learn about them before the deadline to opt out is here. I think they dropped the ball on this one.

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GK2018

Well-known member
Does this have any thing to do with the fact that the VA is moving in the direction on medical service from providers outside their own network/hospitals? If you go to the doctor down the street, doesn't he need to be able to see your pass health records? Chris
I was wondering the same thing but even if it is, we should have to opt in and not have it automatically sent to places we've never even heard of. I'm usually pretty relaxed but I know for me I'm really unhappy about this. This might be a push towards some type of universal health care database or something.

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danemayer

Well-known member
Seems like I remember a change allowing Vets to seek healthcare from private providers, or from VA hospitals. Under HIPPA, in order for the private provider to get a copy of any of your prior medical information, you would have to fill out a specific release form detailing what to release, and how long the release lasts. Depending on how your records are kept, you might have 1 form to fill out, or you might have multiple forms.

Perhaps this is a way to save you that aggravation.

But if it isn't what you want, you should opt out.

While not a vet, my recent experience with getting an MRI disc from one provider to another involved some difficulty. The Doctor couldn't get it from the Hospital without me first filling out a release form at the hospital, releasing the records to either the Doctor or to myself. If I chose the Doctor, I needed to allow 10-14 days for the Doctor to receive the disc. I chose to release information to myself so I could legally get a copy of the disc, and then I had to transport it myself. Not the first time I've had to fill out Hippa releases to get my medical history from one provider to another.

All that to say, Hippa can be a pain. And if you've relocated, it can be a real pain.
 

SNOKING

Well-known member
I called a Mesa Az hospital and asked about getting a disk with a MRI their records and did a followup MRI. So my advice is to ask for it in person before "going home"!
 

GK2018

Well-known member
Seems like I remember a change allowing Vets to seek healthcare from private providers, or from VA hospitals. Under HIPPA, in order for the private provider to get a copy of any of your prior medical information, you would have to fill out a specific release form detailing what to release, and how long the release lasts. Depending on how your records are kept, you might have 1 form to fill out, or you might have multiple forms.

Perhaps this is a way to save you that aggravation.

But if it isn't what you want, you should opt out.

While not a vet, my recent experience with getting an MRI disc from one provider to another involved some difficulty. The Doctor couldn't get it from the Hospital without me first filling out a release form at the hospital, releasing the records to either the Doctor or to myself. If I chose the Doctor, I needed to allow 10-14 days for the Doctor to receive the disc. I chose to release information to myself so I could legally get a copy of the disc, and then I had to transport it myself. Not the first time I've had to fill out Hippa releases to get my medical history from one provider to another.

All that to say, Hippa can be a pain. And if you've relocated, it can be a real pain.
They gave us the option to see a private provider if we're so many miles away from a VA hospital or clinic which I'm all for. I can see where this could be beneficial if when we went to see another doctor then that doctor could pull the records from the VA but this isnt like that. This is where the VA is just giving our medical records away to third party entities and other government agencies who I'm sure none of us even know who they are and what all they are planning to do with these records not to mention it's all without our consent. Almost everyone i've spoken to found out this information on Thursday and Friday with Monday being the deadline to opt out of it (not tot mention the VA is closed on the weekends to be able to submit this opt out form) and there are some VA hospitals who dont even have the forms to pick up in person nor do they even know where to submit these forms after you turn them in to opt out of this. From what I've been reading some but not all of these third party entities that is about to get mass amounts of veteran patient records which will have our names and other personally identifiable information are going to be used to provide statistical data which to me is just like what happened during the cambridge analytica scandal that rocked Facebook.

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GK2018

Well-known member
I called a Mesa Az hospital and asked about getting a disk with a MRI their records and did a followup MRI. So my advice is to ask for it in person before "going home"!
I completely agree every time I go to the doctor I have them print me a copy of my visit and then I file it away. When I was active duty they lost 2 years worth of my medical records which luckily I had copies of!

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mlpeloquin

Well-known member
Although not eligible for VA care, the ability to legitimately access a patients records outside the primary system is a good idea. Consider needing emergency care away from your primary care provider and you are not able to provide pertinent information on existing conditions and medications. Could make a major difference in the treatment you receive.


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Kaiser in California will give you a memory stick with your records to take with you. They have you set up a password to access the data. Problem solved. We get it updated yearly.
 
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