HIPAA Privacy Exceptions And The Duty To Warn Under State Law

This new, advanced webinar identifies and applies exceptions to HIPAA confidentiality where state law mandates a duty to warn of a patient’s specific threat of a violence against an identified person or group.  Erase the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that occurs when duty to warn laws conflict with HIPAA confidentiality in a mental health or other medical context.  

Understand HIPAA exceptions as applied to the duty to warn – these are matters of life and death, especially for mental health practitioners.  Medical confidentiality under HIPAA and a mental health care professional’s duty to warn clash in federal and state law. 

This webinar provides an overview of HIPAA and the duty to warn under state law, including state tort standards creating this liability for mental health care professionals and other health care professionals.  But how does the health care professional breach patient confidentiality and still comply with the privacy mandates of HIPAA?

Basic state laws will be reviewed giving a safe harbor under patient confidentiality and HIPAA exceptions.  An analysis of three court cases guides the attendee on real-world outcomes from actual cases.  Finally, the attendees will learn basic tips and techniques to avoid liability.

Webinar Objectives

• HIPAA privacy includes exceptions for state-law duty to warn – where federal and state law may conflict;
• State tort standards imposing a common law duty to warn – yet are allowed under strict HIPAA exceptions;
• State statures giving a safe harbor for the common law duty to warn – these are totally not addressed by HIPAA, and they vary from state to state;
• Three cases and three outcomes – a detailed analysis – how specific situations arise and their differing outcomes in the courts, and;
• Basic tips and techniques to defend yourself from liability – how successfully to defend yourself from liability yet comply with HIPAA and state law duty to warn.

Webinar Agenda

HIPAA mandates strict confidentiality of protected health information with few exceptions. One exception is where disclosure is mandated or allowed by state law. The state law duty to warn is just such a specific exception.  Find out how HIPAA’s federal law requirements dovetail with the state law duty to warn in patient violence situations that are a matter of life and death.

Webinar Highlights

• HIPAA privacy exceptions for state-law duty to warn;
• State tort standards imposing a common law duty to warn;
• State statures giving a safe harbor for the common law duty to warn;
• Three cases and three outcomes – a detailed analysis, and;
• Basic tips and techniques to defend yourself from liability.

Who Should Attend

• Health care attorneys
• Risk management officers
• Corporate compliance officers in health care
• Medical records staff of medical offices and health care entities
• Hospital attorneys; health care practitioners who are covered entities
• Law enforcement officers in health care compliance
• State boards and agencies with jurisdiction over state licenses to practice a health care profession