My Support Forums - View Single Post - New therapist soon...but found something distressing out about old one

amandalouise · Mar 21, 2011, 09:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spacemonkey36

Hey,

I quit getting services/whatever from the last place because I felt like our "connection" was over, and the therapist/patient relationship and my own sense of trust was basically over-done-non-existant. Which really hurt, because I had a sneaking suspicion that the therapists, case managers, and workers, were discussing me amongst themselves, but had no proof.

Well, w/o going into a long story about how I met my new "therapist to be" it happens that she used to work there. And she was honest and told me she knew who I was already, and "had heard a lot about me around _______ Agency. Which, as she put it, "means that there were people you were being talked about to that had no business knowing anything--including your name...the fact that I even know your name (she wasn't involved in my care) should show something." I told her I already knew I was probably a "lunchroom joke" around there, and it was due to lies on the part of my family, and a misdiagnosis by an unsupervised 3rd year medical student at another facility, who was allowed to put an inaccurate psychiatric diagnosis about me on my medical record with no challenge or supervision.

Well, she and many others have "found their conscience," as I put it, and no longer work there. I trust her--I also am friends with her husband--and she has agreed to see me on sliding scale!!!

I told her, that my life is a lot different even than when at the prior place, and that I believe a person's recovery-medical or psychiatric-is in their hands. Doctors/pnurses, etc, can do their part and operate, or maybe correct chemistry, but the recovery--working the muscles that are weak after surgery, or the coping skills, and helping yourself heal after some trauma, or maybe after some kind of loss, is up to the person themselves. That too, is her philosophy. So, it sounds like a great fit.

But here's my dilemma. I have to decide whether or not to report the HIPAA violation to the proper authorities--which could affect my housing situation come September, and as of September, it's going to exceed the 3 year deadline I have to report the punishable violations, which were apparently very huge, and on multiple occassions.

My father, whenever I express negative feelings towards what has occurred with the previous organization (as does any member of my family), gets angry with me, and says something like, "I feel so upset when I hear you so angry and talk about them like that after all they did to help you." Well, the woman affiliated with them who helps out with housing, yeah, she's been indespensible, but the rest of them treated me like an imbecile (and I have had neuropsych testing, including an IQ test, which put me at 171--so I am not an imbecile), talked to me like I was 'crazy' and made me feel about 2mm tall. And always like I had done something wrong. I was on no pain meds, or "controlled substances" but they would UA me anyhow--and I always passed--not even one single test did I "fail," and I think that ticked them off. But no one ever acted like they trusted me. I told my CM about the sons I had at 16 and gave up for adoption~it had been a twin birth, but one of them did not make it...he died in an car wreck a few years ago...and my sister who has mental issues-putting it mildly--told them I was lying. I showed the CM their birth certificate, adoption papers, and the one son's death certificate. She accused me of downloading them and faking it.

I also had been in the process of being diagnosed by an independent rheumatologist with multiple autoimmune disorders. Diagnoses which were later confirmed. Apparently, I lied about that too.

I began drinking from the stress, which I have now been sober from for over 2 1/2 years, and I really haven't thought about them in a long time.

I don' want to risk my housing--without the help of the housing person, who is only loosely connected, and would likely help anyhow, but I am not 100% sure...I won't have funding to afford anywhere to go. I am having major hip surgery soon, and will still be recovering in September.

So, do I report the HIPAA violations? I would also need my new therapists' cooperation.

Thoughts anyone?

Thanks,
JJ

I cant tell you whether you should report this or not. only you know whether you should report it or not based on your own feelings and experience with this agency.

But I would suggest before making your decisions find out if that agency is a teaching agency. by that I mean is this agency one in which like here they do team teaching and team working for the better of their clients. here we have meetings and discussions about our clients so that we are all working on the same page. we also bring our problems with our clients to the team meetings to get suggestions on how to best help the clients. during these meetings we do share names of the clients and their backgrounds and their cases. this way when one of us is on vacation or manning the phones should that client have a problem we are all aware of whats going on and we can help this client through that crisis during the absence of their therapist, or through the night until they can get in to see their therapist. doing this doesnt go against the privacy laws. the privacy laws prevent us from going to people outside the agency and disclosing anything without the clients permission aka their friends , familys other treatment providers outside the agency.

if this place you are talking about is an agency that works the team approach or is a teaching agency they probably didnt break any laws. thats not saying you are wrong in how you feel, its natural to feel violated if you were not told you would be a topic of discussion among the other treatment providers.

money wise if you live in the USA there is no cost to you for reporting and prosecuting a treatment provider that breaks privacy laws. the way to do it is to contact the mental health agency that over sees therapists in your area. put in writing your complaint. they will call you for a face to face interview to discuss the problem, then if they feel a breach of privacy laws happened they will give notice to the offending therapist that they must attend an ethics review, why and who made the complaint.

Here in america anyone accused of a crime has the right to defend their self and also know who their accuser is and face their accuser. So you will also receive notice of when the ethics review is and when to appear to give your testimony.

it could end with the ethic review board upholding your accusation and taking action against the therapist or it could end with the ethics board finding no grounds for the accusation.

if a privacy law has been broken no trial happens unless you contact the civil rights department. they will take your statement, contact the therapist and ethics board. should they decide theres enough grounds to warrant prosecution they do so at no cost to you. the only thing you will have to do in the civil rights case is appear in court and give your sworn testimony before a jury and judge. the court costs are usually a part of what the person breaking the law has to do as restitution.

again we cant tell you what to do only you can decide to report or not. the cases around here that have been reported some were found to be upheld and the treatment providers sanctioned and other times it was called no grounds/unfounded. so it can go either way.