Search Privacy Violations, Breaches and Complaints
This database was last updated in December 2015 ago and should only be used as a historical snapshot. More recent data on breaches affecting 500 or more people is available at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Breach Portal.
Birmingham VA Medical Center
Mentioned in a privacy incident report created by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs on March 3, 2015. Also cited in 26 other reports.
Report ID: PSETS0000116182, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
Reported Entity: BIRMINGHAM AL - 521
Issue:
Birmingham VA Medical Center (BVAMC) Privacy Officer (PO) was notified by Chief, Mental Health, that the daughter of a patient called accusing a social worker in the Mental Health unit of passing information about her father who is a veteran patient to the social worker's wife who works for a sitter company. The daughter alleges that the wife of the social worker told her she has inside information regarding her father and the daughter states that the social worker is passing her father's information to his wife. The daughter went to see the social worker on March 2, 2015, at which time the social worker printed information regarding a visit the social worker made to father and gave the printout to the daughter without a signed authorization or identification.
Outcome:
05/18/15: The Incident Resolution Service Team has determined that the Veteran will be sent a HIPAA notification letter due to Protected Health Information (PHI) being disclosed. 05/29/15: The letter has been mailed to the Veteran. OIG is investigating the employee on ethical misconduct and do not want to do any corrective actions/mitigations on the privacy violation until they have completed the full investigation.