I understand what you are saying - sm Posted: Nov 11th, 2017 - 6:29 pm In Reply to: when we first went with this ADT stuff, my PC said that the doctor - sm
but I want to offer you the other side of this.
First, we should absolutely be paid for ADT. Of course, it would only be like a line or 2, but it would be something.
All medical records are electronic now. That means that a blank can be filled in, but what is printed is challenging if not impossible to remove.
When the Equifax breach happened, I looked at my credit report and found an item in collections for $108. It was dated June 2017. Because of the crappy insurance with this company, I haven't been to any doctor, hospital, clinic, etc. since December 29, 2016, so I knew immediately that the charge was not mine. I checked my insurance website to make sure there were no visits billed, and there were not. I challenged the collections through Equifax, who informed me that it was me. I sent them a letter from my insurance company stating I had not been seen at that facility in over a year. Equifax responded that the facility is within 50 miles of me, so it is believable that I would be a patient of theirs. I then contacted the hospital, and I had no bills from 2017. I asked if the physician who billed me was on staff. He is an ER doctor. I asked for his number, which they gave me. I contacted his billing office and was told I had a charge for an ER visit. I explained all this to them. It turns out that the doctor mis-keyed information and now I am a 73-year-old gentleman (I'm an under-50 woman) with a heart condition. Despite all the discrepancies (name, age, even nationality) this information will remain in my chart and part of my medical history until I go through the process to remove it. In the meantime, I could be denied life insurance, if I need surgery I may have to see a cardiologist for screening (!!!) and this bill will sit in collections, among other things.
I know this does not make the pain of searching weirdly-spelled patient names and sorting through admit dates any better. But I hope putting a human on the end of that report is enough thanks for saving other patients from going through what I'm going through.
Personally, I believe every time a dictator mis-codes a dictation it should be a HIPAA violation for that dictator, and I believe it should be physically impossible to key in blank patient identifiers.
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