Becker's Hospital Review

49 CIO / HEALTH IT Wisconsin hospital, Ciox Health to pay $35M for medical record overcharges By Jackie Drees M ilwaukee-based Aurora Health Care and Ciox Health, a medical records management compa- ny, agreed to pay $35.4 million to settle a class-action lawsuit that claimed the orga- nizations overcharged for medical record requests, according to Top Class Actions. Individuals who were required to pay a medical records request fee of $22.58 by Ciox Health, IOD, HealthPort, Aurora Health Care or Columbia St. Mary's hos- pital in Milwaukee may benefit from the settlement, according to the report. Ciox Health is the result of a 2015 merger be- tween healthcare technology companies HealthPort, IOD, Care Communica- tions and ECS. Ciox Health and Aurora Health Care al- legedly inappropriately charged for the medical record requests between July 1, 2011, and Aug. 1, 2019. Wisconsin law states that every patient has the right to view and receive a copy of their medi- cal records, according to the report. e fees were allegedly charged both to pa- tients as well as individuals who were authorized to access medical records on the patient's behalf. Ciox Health and Aurora Health Care said they agreed to the settlement be- cause "there was ambiguity as to wheth- er they would succeed at trial," the pub- lication reported. Individuals who paid a fee to access medical records will be able to make a claim for a cash payment for approxi- mately twice the amount originally paid in fees, according to the report. n Allina Health MyChart glitch sent false alerts to thousands of patients By Jackie Drees T housands of Allina Health patients received a false email Sept. 19 and Sept. 20 that said their email address for MyChart, the Minneapolis-based health system's EHR patient portal, had been changed, Star Tribune reported. An Allina Health spokesperson told the publication the email message was incorrect, and no patient contact information had been altered and no data was breached. The false email message was the result of a "technical glitch" between Allina Health accounts and the MyChart accounts they are linked to, according to the report. My- Chart is an online and mobile-based application that allows patients to view their health information and test results, among other functions. The glitch occurred during the uploading process and triggered an incorrect email alert. Allina Health officials told patients Sept. 20 that there was no need for anyone who received the error message to contact the health system. n Most hospital data breaches contain financial, demographic info that risks identity theft By Jackie Drees S eventy-one percent of data breaches at hospitals include financial or demo- graphic information that may cause identity theft or fraud, according to a study published in Annals of Internal Medicine. East Lansing-based Michigan State University and Baltimore-based Johns Hop- kins University researchers studied 1,461 protected health information breaches over the past decade to analyze the types of data that were compromised in hos- pital breaches. Information included in the study was categorized as demographic, service or fi- nancial, or medical. Demographic data included names, email addresses and oth- er personal identifiers. Service or financial data included the service date, billing amount and payment information. Medical data included diagnoses or treatment. Three additional notes: 1. Of all 1,461 total breaches examined, researchers found each one contained at least one piece of demographic information. 2. Seventy-one percent of the breaches affecting 159 million patients compro- mised demographic or financial data that could be used for financial or identity fraud. 3. Two percent of the breaches impacting 2.4 million patients included sensitive medical information that could threaten their clinical privacy. Study authors concluded that policymakers should consider establishing require- ments so organizations must disclose what types of data were compromised during a breach. n

• Cover