Medical information confidentiality – little of it at Bonitas

Bonitas medical fund has for years now been sending me loads of confidential medical information regarding one of their members by e-mail. Presumably, an address had either been given incorrectly by the patient or captured incorrectly by Bonitas. Despite the fact that I have written to inform them of this, the e-mails have not stopped coming.

A recent one deals with a claim for OTHER SPECIFIED MISADVENTURES DURING SURGICAL AND MEDICAL CARE (codeY65.8) which leaves me wondering about the code for unspecified misadventures might be and why this is not something that the medical services provider should fix for their own account. Nevertheless, the privacy of the patient is being egregiously violated and (of course) she has no way of knowing this. Both the e-mail and the letter contain the following text.

This information is confidential and only intended for the beneficiary specified above, or in the case of a minor, the legal guardian or parent. The sender hereof cannot be held responsible for what happens if the recipient shares this information with any other person.

In other words, Bonitas cavalierly indemnifies themselves and me – surely a legal impossibility – from whatever happens to this information. In any event, service providers can avoid a lot of this mess by using the Yimi or Yimi1234 systems for obtaining patient information. Bonitas might want to get their house in order.