Everyone has been a patient in some fashion in their lives. Most have no clue as to what their rights are, even though they’re required to sign a form with every visit that allows for them to be treated. Patients actually have a lot of rights they don’t know about, and luckily, most of the time they don’t need to know about them. But when they do, or feel they do, they’re often unsure of where to go and what to do.
The first legal right is the right of self determination. In other words, no doctor or hospital can force you to do anything you don’t want to do as it regards your care. That does come with qualifications, however. Though they can’t force you to do something, they can force you to accept financial responsibility for your care if you decide you don’t agree with their decisions and your insurance company cuts you off. You can always appeal to your insurance carrier, but it’s something you have to deal with. And if you’re deemed mentally incompetent, they can hold you against your will, but have to try to contact whomever might be allowed to make decisions for you, such as a family member or someone else who has been given legal rights to consent to treatment for you, known as power of attorney.
You have the right to your medical records at any time from any entity. They’re allowed to charge you up to 75 cents a page, but they have to produce it for you if you ask for it. There are caveats here as well. No party has to give you information that they got from a 3rd party. This means if your doctor received lab results from another entity that they don’t have to give you copies of those results. You then have to get those results directly from the other entity, but you’d have to be cognizant of that fact, as your physician’s office doesn’t have to volunteer information you don’t ask about.
Privacy is the biggest thing patients are allowed to have, based on the 1997 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Your information must be protected at all times, even to the point where others aren’t allowed to see that you’ve signed in for services at a hospital, or at least can’t see your name, since they will see you physically. Both hospitals and physicians have to verify without a doubt that you are who you say you are. There’s also certain information that’s disallowed to show up on a hospital bill because there’s no confirmation as to who might be opening up a bill.
Finally, you have the right to information regarding your hospital bill, financial assistance, and any other financial issues that you might have with any medical entities. There might be paperwork you’ll have to fill out to quality for some of these things, but they’re supposed to be offered to you in some fashion.
