Notice of Privacy
This Notice described how medical information about you may be used and disclosed and how you can get access to the information. Please review carefully

The Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act of 1996 ("HIPAA") is a federal program that requires that all medical records and other individually indentifiable health information used or disclosed by us in any form, whether electronically, on paper, or orally, are kept properly condidential. This Act gives you, the patient, significant new rights to understand and control how you health information is used. "HIPAA" provides penalties for covered entities that misuse personal health information.

As required by "HIPAA", we have prepared this explaination of how we are required to maintain the privacy of your health information and how we may use and disclose your health information.

We may use and disclose your medical records only for each of the following purposed: treatment, payment and health care operations.
-TREATMENT means providing, coordinating, or managing health care and related services by one or more health care providers. An example of this would include a physical examination.
-PAYMENT means such activities as obtaining reimbursment for services, confirming coverage, billing or collection activities, and utilization review. An example of this would be sending a bill for your visit to your insurance company for payment.
-HEALTH CARE OPERATIONS include tha business aspects of running our practice, such as conducting quality assessment and improvement activities, auditing functions, cost-management analysis, and customer service. An example would be an internal quality assessment review.

We may also create and distribute de-identified health information by removing all references to individually indentifiable information.

We may contact you to provide appointment reminders of information about treatment alternatives or other health-related benefits and services that may be of interest to you.
Any other uses and disclosures will be made only with your written authorization. You may resolve such authorization in writing and we are required to honor and abide by that written request, except to the extent that we have already taken action relying on your authorization.
You have the following rights with respect to your protected health information, which you can exercise by presenting a written request to the Privacy Officer:

-The right to request restrictions on certain uses and disclosures of protected health information, including those related to disclosures to family members, other relatives,close personal friends, or any other person identified by you. We are however, not required to agree to a requested restriction. If we do agree to a restriction, we must abide by it unless you agree in writing to remove it.
-The right to reasonable requests to recieve confidential communications of protected health information from us by alternative means or at alternative locations.
-The right to inspect and copy your protected health information.
-The right to amend your protected health information.
-The right to recieve an accounting of disclosures of protected health information.
-The right to obtain a paper copy of this notice from us upon request.

We are required by law to maintain the privacy of your protected information and to provide you with notice of our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to protected health information.

This notaice is effective as of April 14, 2003 and we are reequired to abide by the terms of the notice of Privacy Practices currently in effect. We reserve the right to change the terms of our Notice of Privacy Practices and to make the new notice provisions effective for all prtected health information that we maintain. We will post and you may request a wrtiin copy of a revised Notice of Privacy Practices fron this office.

You have recourse if you feel that your privacy protection has been violated. You have the right to file written complaint with our office, or with the Department of Health & Human Services, Office of Civil Rights, about violations of the provisions of this notice or the policies and procedures of our office. We will not retaliate against you for filing a complaint.
Please contact us for more information:
For more information about HIPAA or to file a compalint:

The U.S. Department of Health & Humans Services Office of Civil Rights
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201
(202) 619-0257
Toll Free: 1-877-696-6775