I don't see anything "stupid" about a mother contacting another mother to try to resolve a problem (that may or may not even be a problem) before involving everybody and their brother. Everyone has a right to their own opinion.
I think the majority of people in general are a little naive when it comes to HIPAA though. Everyone is making something that is very complex seem so cut and dried. It's not. Just because you didn't meet a person and shake their hand doesn't mean that they were not "involved in your care" or that they don't have the right to access your record.
True. But then the Privacy Officer would have the person explain exactly how they were involved in the patient's care. If the attending MD for the OP's DS (let's call him Dr.X) asked Dr.ER Mom to review his CT scan for some reason, then the explanation by Dr.ER Mom would be "Yes, I did review that CT scan as part of the patient's trauma work-up as requested by the patient's attending physician Dr.X". Of course then the issue becomes "so, you had legitimate access to the patient's chart and a couple of days later your DD comes to school stating to the patient that you said the patient wasn't injured"....still a problem because now someone with legitimate access to the patient's chart then violated HIPAA. Or at least her DD says she did. At the very least the DD needs to be taught how much trouble she can get her mother in by shooting her mouth off and at the very most the Dr.ER Mom needs to be reprimanded if it can, in fact, be proven that she violated HIPAA.
Who's to say that an MD from hospital ABC didn't request that an MD (mom?) at hospital XYZ look at the CT and collaborate about the findings? The "minimum extent necessary" and all those other phrases you'll find throughout HIPAA are determined by the providers, not the patients. Everyone seeking medical care signs papers that say just that.
Then Dr.ER Mom would be able to explain that, as noted above.
So, even if the mom's name is on this list that everyone thinks is going to be a piece of cake to obtain, that doesn't automatically mean that she violated HIPAA. Assuming that the mom did access the record and had a reason to do so, it would be nearly impossible to prove that she said anything to her daughter. Thankfully, people can't lose their jobs because Bobby's mom said that Suzy's mom did such and such.
True, but when Suzy says directly to Bobby "My Mom the ER MD said she looked at your CT scan and you didn't have a concussion", it becomes a bit more of an issue. How would Suzy know that other wise? Even if Suzy's Mom had legitimate access to the record, speakign about the contents of it is still a HIPAA violation. Like if I am taking care of a friend of my mother's, I cannot come home and say "Mom I took care of Mrs.Smith today and she has pneumonia and is on antibiotics". Actually I can't tell Mom I even took care of Mrs.Smith unless Mrs.Smith tells me it's OK.
More than one person would have to be involved in MD mom's ability to obtain records that she shouldn't have access to. She couldn't just go and pull up the record from another hospital on her own without any help. Help being someone at the other hospital giving her access, and I just don't believe this high school rumor is really the conspiracy that it would have to be for this story to be true. It'll be interesting to see what the outcome is either way.
Yes it will.