HIV dr's marketing letter

[woodshere]

Mr Dr has recently closed his practice and I have found a new doctor.  This weekend I received a marketing letter from a medical office associated with one of the large area hospitals.  The letter mentions one of their doctors that is accepting new patients. Of course the letter said nothing regarding the fact that my former doctor was an HIV specialist or that the doctor mentioned in the letter is also. I am just wondering where the large medical practice got my name, it had to be from my old Dr's office.  Can my doctor's office just give my name to any practice?  I did sign some forms to release my medical records to my new doctor, but I think that is all I signed.  It seems like this would be a HIPPA violation.

Woods

[emeraldize]

Hi Woods

I think this portion of your post holds the probable key...
from a medical office associated with one of the large area hospitals.
The mailing may well have been generated by the hospital rather than the office affiliated with it.

If you call, they should be able to tell you why you were on the mailing list and whether it was the hospital or the practice. If the latter, then I would start asking more questions.

It is also quite possible they purchased a regional mailing list and blanketed a catchment area they believed reasonable to serve and attractive given available demographics.

Em

[Basquo]

First off, if the practice got your info from the hospital it's not a HIPAA violation unless the hospital got your info underhandedly, and even then it would be hard to prove unless you know that they got specific health-related information underhandedly. If you've ever been a patient at the hospital, even for outpatient testing, there's no HIPAA violation. They are "covered entities" of each other.

Second, I'm with Em in that you might just be on a mailing list.  Many times companies don't even share the info they on you with their client (in this case, the hspital and their clinic.)  They just mail out to a certain demographic or zipcode.

i recently had to deal with a patient who received a cancer diagnosis, then 3 days later got a solicitation from a funeral home.  It was pure coincidence; the funeral home happened to be targeting that zipcode that month.

[woodshere]

Since I haven't been a patient of said hospital or any of their medical practices they actually would have nothing on me......wait, I just remembered my old GP that tested me for HIV is part of this hospital's chain of medical offices throughout the city and made my referral to my former HIV specialist.  I guess they kept track and knew who to target when he closed.  Amazing if you think about it, how many people actual know a person is HIV+.

Thanks Em and Basquo, mystery solved.