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When I was a child, there was a man who was in a wheelchair and had been since birth. He had severe cerebral palsy, and had difficulty speaking. He attended the same church I did, and I was always impressed with his optimistic outlook on life. When I was in university, I came home one weekend and my sister invited me to supper. She and her husband had also invited this man for supper. We were discussing a neighbor who had declared bankrupcy, and had stated "God didn't want me to farm anymore." THis man said "God gave you a brain, so He expects you to use it." That comment has always stayed with me, and reminds me that if I am in troubled times, I am responsible for figuring out a way out of it. I have been so poor I have lived on the street, and I survived. I remember LFC from prior posts some time ago. LFC, I do not believe that administration charging for chat means he does not believe in God. It means he has to cover his costs. This site is a business - and no one works to lose money. LFC, if you have financial troubles, there are agencies and community groups available to assist you. You have options. To blame someone else for something that is currently unavailable to you and using God as an excuse is just that - an excuse.

Something else to keep in mind is that treatment and health care operations are both permitted uses of health care information and are not limited by HIPAA. Treatment is defined as the following. "Treatment is the provision, coordination, or management of health care and related services for an individual by one or more health care providers..." As such, I would argue that disclosing that a frequent flier has a communicable disease and, in the past, has spat on crew members is an important piece of information for providing and coordinating health care and related services. http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/understanding/summary/index.html

Dust? Wasn't going to but now I will rant. It aggravates the heck out of me when people blame God for the bad they are facing when in fact often you can look and see how you or another human caused your bad state. Heck when I was broke it wasn't God punishing me it was I was stupid with money when I had it. When those babies died in the car wreck it was not God needing another angel that caused their death it was the parents not properly securing them because they did not want to take the time or hear the baby cry. In reality most of the time those blaming God for something bad are just trying to avoid accepting responsibility for their mistakes. Rant done for now.

Last time I was in a church, for a religious service, they gave me an envelope on the way in and half way through, sent people around with long wooden poles that had baskets on the end. You lost me when you brought religion into a debate over whether an EMS Chat-room should be free or not. I suggest a free social networking site.

Your entire whiney rant makes no sense at all. Admin charges for chat, therefore Admin doesn't believe in God? If God wanted him fed, then he'd feed him so there is not need to charge? Are you insane? When you take a job do you then refuse your paycheck because you're confident that God will feed and care for you? Perhaps God doesn't want you to chat and that is why He's allowed you to fall into such a position that you can't afford a few dollars for the chat room? Or maybe, he simply wants you to stay out of the chat room and go outside where you are most likely to resolve your financial issues? If you want to beg your online friends to buy your membership, show some self esteem and simply say, "I've fallen on hard times, can someone buy me a membership?" instead of trying to come up with some ridiculous religious based charade. I wish the best for you, believe it or not, but sometimes enough is just enough. Dwayne Edited for typos. No contextual changes made.

I always understood protected information to be things that would lead to identification of a patient...that's usually how I see it. I see 3 different situatiosn here. Ex1: Patient tells you an interesting NYTimes article he was reading about. Or a funny interaction he had with a co-worker 10 years ago. That information by itself would be fair to repeat, right? So, it wouldn't then be confidential MERELY by the fact that it was said during treatment. Ex2: Patient tells you some really interesting story that involves him. If you tell someone else that information with the fact taht it's HIS story, you'd in effect be violating HIPAA only by identifying your patient. But if you leave out the identifying info...I have never been told that info by itself is confidential. Ex3: BUT if patient decides to tell you how he's robbing a banks through some computer glitch at his IT job, making millions each year...is can you tell THAT? (it's not mandated reporting) I THINK I was told crimes are reportable...but it makes sense not to report most of them... Thoughts?

What do you mean telling someone? Do you mean telling other health care professionals/ law enforcement? Or do you mean talking about something a pt told you to someone not in a professional setting? If it is the former, I think you are well with in your rights to tell the professional what they told you (ie, if someone admits to assaulting another person...). I do not think it is legal to tell the info to someone else. Simply by telling them the non-medical information, you are inadvertently divulging medical information, specifically that that person was transported by you, which I believe is protected information.

"Wackerdom" be damned. I am still not going to wear the joke T-shirt Lady J got me, that says

WHAT! Things have changed. You didn't used to have to pay to chat and now you do. I have lost my job and have no financial income coming in and this is when it's the crucial time that I need someone to chat with and you have to pay to chat. NUTS. I can pay a phychologist if I had the money. This is probably why I have not come back because I new that there would be a cost. You know God never decides to charge us for talking to him. Just think about that. If you are charging for people to talk, then you have lost your faith that God will meet all your needs(bills) in His time. I would like to stay here and chat was my most important thing, but if it's gonna cost me anything I don't think I will be coming back. I'll miss yall. Dina Krasny

I work for a first responder agency. we do not transport, we have our local ems agency transport all patients. Lately I have been making all effort to NOT have to result in a patient being transported unless their life is in danger. For example I wanted on scene for about 30 minutes waiting for a patients family to come get them and transport the patient their self. I think I did the right thing, but by doing that am I cheating the local ems agency out of runs? your thoughts please