You may have heard the rumor there is no lawsuit available under HIPAA. It’s probably why you can’t find many lawyers that handle these types of cases. But, the statement there is no lawsuit available under HIPAA is misleading. My firm for years has been successfully prosecuting HIPAA violation cases for people whose lives have been turned upside down when a doctor or hospital has violated their medical privacy rights.
While HIPAA itself does not provide the ability to sue, it provides standards and rules that doctors and hospitals must follow. In Florida, every medical provider and doctor must comply with HIPAA. They receive training and handouts and disciplinary actions can be taken against them when they violate HIPAA.
There are also state laws in Florida and many other states which provide additional protections of the confidentiality of a person’s medical information.
While neither HIPAA itself nor the Florida statutes provide the ability to sue for a violation of those laws and regulations, there are other ways to take legal action. That is because these laws and regulations represent something important. They represent the standard of care that medical providers and doctors must follow. So, when a doctor violates HIPAA or violates certain Florida laws protecting your medical privacy, they have violated the standard of care and may have acted negligently.
Florida law has long recognized that when a statute creates rules an industry must follow, that statute represents the legal standard of care for that industry. So when a violation of a statute occurs and a person is injured, that injured person may have a negligence action available to them.
When the violation is caused by an employee who has been improperly or insufficiently trained on HIPAA, a person has available to them a negligence action called negligent training against the employer.
There are sometimes also other available legal actions which a person can take against doctors or medical providers to seek justice for the violation of their medical privacy rights.
The McKenzie Law Firm has been representing victims of medical privacy violations for years. If you have followed these two steps and still wish to pursue legal action against the medical provider, please contact our firm.
