Bush to Implement Clinton's Medical Privacy Rules

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By Lisa Richwine

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush on Thursday ordered implementation of sweeping patient privacy rules issued by the administration of former President Bill Clinton to give patients more control over their medical records.

The measures, proposed by Clinton as one of his final directives before leaving office in January, require health care plans and providers to let patients know to whom their medical information is being disclosed and how it is to be used.

Health insurers and some Republican lawmakers had urged the Bush administration to block or delay the rules. But Bush reversed his trend of discarding Clinton polices that had irked industry groups.

Personal medical data increasingly is transmitted digitally between doctors, hospitals and insurers.

In a statement, Bush acknowledged growing public concern regarding medical privacy, saying, "New technologies have at times made it more difficult to protect personal medical information."

The Department of Health and Human Services will begin gradually putting the rules in place, with full compliance required by April 14, 2003. Clinton's proposal had also allowed two years for compliance.

GUIDELINES PROMISED

Health Secretary Tommy Thompson said his agency would issue guidelines to clarify portions of the rules and ensure that doctors and hospitals had access to needed data and could consult other physicians.

The American Medical Association said doctors would need the full two years to modify their practices to be able to comply.

The rules were originally due to take effect on Feb. 26, and privacy advocates and some Democrats had criticized the Bush administration for delaying them. But a spokesman for Thompson said Clinton's failure to notify Congress properly had triggered by law a 60-day waiting period before they could be implemented.

Privacy groups and Democrats praised Bush's move, while industry groups and Republican lawmakers said they hoped Thompson would move quickly to amend the rules.

Joy Pritts, senior counsel for Georgetown University's Health Privacy Project, welcomed the unexpected announcement, saying she was "very surprised" that Bush had gone ahead with the regulations after signals that they might be further delayed.

"This is the first federal law establishing protections for general health information. It affects everyone who has health information in the United States," Pritts said.

Health industry groups have warned that the rules could cost up to $18 billion over 10 years.

INDUSTRY SEES SERIOUS FLAWS

Chip Kahn, president of the Health Insurance Association of America, said the regulations were "seriously flawed and likely to adversely affect the quality and affordability of care."

But Kahn said he was "encouraged that (Thompson) intends to fix serious problems."

Bush has pleased conservatives and outraged many liberals by overturning some Clinton policies. He withdrew a Clinton rule that would have cut the permissible amount of arsenic in drinking water and repealed a measure aimed at reducing repetitive strain injuries.

Thompson said he would work to ensure that confusing consent forms did not hamper patient care and that pharmacists still could fill prescriptions over the telephone.

Parents would also have access to their children's health information, including data about mental health, drug abuse or abortion, Thompson said.

Dr. Donald Palmisano, in a statement for the AMA, said "many areas of the rule need strengthening," in part to cover employers, marketers, life insurers and others who may have access to medical records.

"In addition to being too costly and too complex, the regulations fail to fully protect the privacy of all Americans," said Billy Tauzin, the Louisiana Republican who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

Thompson had said on Monday that the administration would probably not be able to meet a Saturday deadline for deciding whether to implement the rules because it had received 24,000 comments on them in the previous 30 days.

Just great. Something gets done that the general public likes and it will not get implimented because of a technicality!

-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), April 12, 2001


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