We maintain protocols to ensure the security and confidentiality of your personal information. We have physical security in our building, passwords to protract databases, compliance audits, and virus/intrusion detection software. Within our practice, access to your information is limited to those who need it to perform their corresponding jobs.

At out practice, we are committed to treating and using protected health information about you responsibly. This Notice of Privacy Policies describes the personal information we collect, and how and when we use or disclose that information. It also describes your rights as they relate to your protected health information. This Notice is effective April 14, 2003, and applies to all protected health information as defined by federal regulations.

Each time you visit our practice, a record of your visit is made. Typically, this record contains your symptoms, examination and test results, diagnoses, treatment, and a plan for future care or treatment. This information, often referred as to your health or medical record, serves as a:

• Basis for planning your care and treatment,

• Means of communication among the many health professsionals who contribute to your care,

• Legal document describing the care you received,

• Means by which you or a third party payer can verify the services billed were actually provided,

• Tool in educating health professionals,

• Source of data for medical research,

• Source of information for public health officials charged to improve the health of the state and nation,

• Source of data for our planning and marketing, and

• Tool by which we can assess and continually work to improve the care we render and the outcomes we achieve.

Understanding what is in your record and how your health information is used helps you to: ensure its accuracy, better understand who, what, when, where, and why others may access your health information, and make more informed decisions when authorizing disclosure to others.

Although your health record is the physical property of our practice, the information belongs to you. You have the right to:

• Obtain a paper copy of this notice of privacy policies upon request,
• Inspect and copy your health record as provided by 45 CFR 164.524,
• Amend your health record as provided by 45 CFR 164.256,
• Obtain an accounting of disclosures of your health information as provided by 45 CFR 164.528,
• Request confidential communications of your health information as provided by 45 CFR 164.522, and
• Request a restriction on certain uses and disclosures of your information as provided by 45 CFR 164.522 (our practice, however, is not required by law to agree to a requested restriction).

Our practice is requited to:

• Maintain the privacy of your health information,

• Provide you with this notice as to our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to information we collect and maintain about you,

• Abide by the terms of this notice,

• Notify you if we are unable to agree to a requested restriction, and

• Accommodate reasonable requests you may have to communicate your health information.

We reserve the right to change our practices and to make the new provisions effective for all protected health information we maintain. We will keep a posted copy of the most current notice in our facility containing the effective date in the top, right-hand corner. In addition, each time you visit our facility for treatment, you may obtain a copy of the current notice in effect upon request.

We will not use or disclose your health information in a manner other than described in the section regarding Examples Of Disclosures For Treatment, Payment, And Health Operations, without your written authorization, which you may revoke as provided by 45 CFR 164.508(b)(5), except to the extent that action has already been taken.

If you have questions and would like additional infotmation, you may contact our practice at (212) 876.9811.

If you believe your privacy rights have been violated, you can either file a complaint with our Privacy Officer, or with the Office for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. There will be no retaliation for filing a complaint with either our Privacy Officer or the Office for Civil Rights. The address of the Civil Rights Office is as follows:

Office for Civil Rights
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Room 509F, HHH Building
Washington, D.C. 20201

We will use your health information for treatment.

For example:

Information obtained by a nurse, physician, or other member of your health care team will be recorded in your record and used to determine the course of treatment that should work best for you. Your physician will document in your record his or her expectations of the members of your health care team. Members of your health care team will then record the actions they took and their observations. In that way, the physician will know how you are responding to treatment.

We will also provide your other physician(s) or subsequent health care provider(s) (when applicable) with copies of various reports that should assist them in treating you.

We will use your health information for payment.

For example:

A bill may be sent to you or a third-party payer. The information on or accompanying the bill may include information that identifies you, as well as your diagnosis, procedures, and supplies used.

We want you to know that you have the following rights to access and control your health information. These rights are important because they will help you make sure that the health information we have about you is accurate. They may also help you control the way we use your information and share it with others, or the way we communicate with you about your medical matters.

Your Right to Inspect and Copy Records

You have the right to inspect and obtain a copy of any of your health information that may be used to make decisions about you and your treatment for as long as we maintain this information in our records. This includes medical and billing records. To inspect or obtain a copy of your health information, please submit your request in writing to our office manager. If you request a copy of the information, we may charge a fee for the costs of copying, mailing, or other supplies we use to fulfill your request. The standard fee is $0.75 per page and must generally be paid before or at the time we give the copies to you.

We will respond to your request for inspection of records within 10 days. We ordinarily will respond to requests for copies within 30 days if the information is located at our office, and within 60 days if it is located off-site at another facility. If we need additional time to respond to a request for copies, we will notify you in writing within the timeframe above to explain the reason for the delay and when you can expect to have a final answer to your request.