Bystanders with Cell phones and taking pictures

[Kiwiology]

no problem here

the patient or crew can request you stop, however the crew would do so only if it's interfering with pt management

[A Pox On This Place]

The first amendment doesn't allow for battery.

If only there was a word for that. Oh, yea, robbery.

So robbery and distruction of property. I hope you have enough money to replace the cell phone.

1. HIPAA doesn't apply to the general public,

2. There is no expectation of privacy when out in public.

3. How is the camera interfering with your prompt and necessary medical care than someone without a camera?

4. How does a camera interfer with a crime scene, assuming it is a crime scene?

5. How does a camera interfer with accident reconstruction?

No more relevant than all of those strongly worded letters that the UN sends to Iran. I have to follow the laws of what ever area I'm in and the UN neither makes nor enforces those laws.

What civil penalties? Cite applicable laws or cases where someone faced actual penalties for the mere act of filming out in public. Not other violations that might have also occured, but just for the act of filming.

Similarly, HIPAA doesn't require me to go take somene else's film. Is there an ethical imparitive to attempt to prevent it? Sure, but moving the patient to a more private area or having someone hold up something like a sheet fullfills that imperative. Assult, battery, and robbery, however, is not justified.

You're kidding, right? Filiming in a public place is generally allowed but for the obvious things like mens and womens locker rooms at the beach, not. But, in almost every state filming that interferes with police/fire ems operations is prohibited, and actionable. Really? You need a road map?

Uh, filming a childbirfth at a protest with the Great Unwashed may be a very beautiful thing to your generation. To mine it's a serious tort.

I'm glad our medical schools are producing such forward-looking informed individuals like yourself. Ignorant AND condescending, you'll do just fine.

Edited June 2, 2012 by A Pox On This Place

[JPINFV]

You're kidding, right? Filiming in a public place is generally allowed but for the obvious things like mens and womens locker rooms at the beach, not. But, in almost every state filming that interferes with police/fire ems operations is prohibited, and actionable. Really? You need a road map?

If you're going to back up the cameras you better be backing up everyone without a camera as well. You still haven't explained how someone with a camera is somehow interfering with your scene and the person standing next to them without the camera is not interfering with them. ...and yes, there's an expectation of privacy in locker rooms and bathrooms. I just assumed that people wouldn't be obtuse about it.

By the way, let's get a lawyer's opinion on whether we can assault or arrest bystanders just for filimg.

Uh, filming a childbirfth at a protest with the Great Unwashed may be a very beautiful thing to your generation. To mine it's a serious tort.

At least my generation doesn't feel the need to commit battery against individuals engaged in activities that we don't agree with.

[ERDoc]

JP is pretty spot on. Pox, no where did anyone say it was interfering with public safety operations. Maybe you can show on your map where that was said. You also might want to inform yourself before accusing others of being uninformed. The first amendment is also not an absolute. Jurisprudence lags years to decades behind technology so there is probably little presidence. I did find an interesting article (http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/photography-the-first-amendment). Especially read the part about the Porat case. There is also some discussion about accident scenes but it is a gray area from my interpretation.

Personally, I'd take the phone and delete the pictures. Yeah, assault/battery/whatever but if it went to court, I'd take my chances with a sympathetic jury hearing how I tried to protect the privacy and decency of an injured, vulnerable and exposed patient.

[A Pox On This Place]

The concept is called a reasonable expectation of privacy, actually. It can get rather complex. Can people be arrested for filming? Sure as hell. If law enforcement wants to shut off the newsie broadcasting around the block while they're negotiating...think they can?

You're such a linear thinker. Step back and think about LEO's FF's and EMS trying to have a best outcome. Your ACLU sensibilities may be abused but what would you like other than the best outcome possible for your patient?

Edited June 2, 2012 by A Pox On This Place

[DwayneEMTP]

I like to think of it as patient advocacy. Though it's all in theory, assuming he was such a prick, assuming that there was no reasonable way to deal with it, assuming that the police and/or fire wouldn't assist.

I guess I'm still a bit of a knuckle dragger in the fact that I don't believe that someone's right to be an asshole supersedes another's right to have their health and dignity protected.

[A Pox On This Place]

Doc, I realize the First Amendment is not absolute, I was a reporter. I mention interfering with public safety operations as an exception because to me it was posited that it was not.

[JPINFV]

The concept is called a reasonable expectation of privacy, actually. It can get rather complex. Can people be arrested for filming? Sure as hell. If law enforcement wants to shut off the newsie broadcasting around the block while they're negotiating...think they can?

People get arrested all the time and released. Police departments also catch civil rights suits when the intentionally arrest people because they don't like the person's lawful actions. The fact that an accident occurs on the freeway doesn't mean that there is suddently an expectation of privacy on the freeway.

You're such a linear thinker. Step back and think about LEO's FF's and EMS trying to have a best outcome. Your ACLU sensibilities may be abused but what would you like other than the best outcome possible for your patient?

How does someone with a camera affect the outcome anymore than the person standing next to them sans camera?

Doc, I realize the First Amendment is not absolute, I was a reporter. I mention interfering with public safety operations as an exception because to me it was posited that it was not.

You haven't explained how the person with a camera is interfering with a public safety operation any more than the person next to them without the camera. If you're at an accident scene do you also call the FAA to get the news helicopters to move? Do you have a police officer go into the buildings adjacent to an emergency scene to make sure that no one looks out a window, or worse, look out the window with a camera? You've yet to show how the presence of a camera interfers with your scene.

I like to think of it as patient advocacy. Though it's all in theory, assuming he was such a prick, assuming that there was no reasonable way to deal with it, assuming that the police and/or fire wouldn't assist.

I guess I'm still a bit of a knuckle dragger in the fact that I don't believe that someone's right to be an asshole supersedes another's right to have their health and dignity protected.

Maybe I'm an ACLU loving pinko-commie libertarian, but I don't see how people have a sense of privacy (outside special areas like bathrooms, least we get another obtuse comment), and I don't see how someone feels that they have the right to engage in physical and ultimately criminal activity, nor expect represtatives of the state to use their power, to force another individual to stop engaging in a lawful action.

I'm not arguing that it's not an asshole move to film a medical scene in public. However being an asshole isn't illegal. Want to make it illegal, there's a method for that. Petitiion the state legislature to make it illegal. Until then, I can't condone criminal or illegitimate use of force agaisnt a lawful action.

[A Pox On This Place]

You're denying the general exception to interfering with public safety/ems operations in most state statutes...

[JPINFV]

You're denying the general exception to interfering with public safety/ems operations in most state statutes...

You haven't established that the simple action of filming is any more interfering with the operation than standing there watching it sans camera.

Edit to add: If I'm standing at a close enough distance that I'm interfering with the operation simply because of my presence, then whether I have a camera or not is irrelevant. No one is arguing that a reasonable exclusion zone can't be made. What's being argued is that there isn't one line for people without cameras and another line for people with cameras.

Edited June 2, 2012 by JPINFV