Confidentiality & HIPAA

What are Confidentiality and HIPAA?

The clinician-patient relationship is protected by law by keeping information confidential. Your protected health information belongs to you, and I cannot share this information without your consent and disclosure. You may reference the confidentiality and HIPAA forms. (Can you devise a link that will take them to the forms section.

However, state/federal law and professional ethics require mental health clinicians to maintain confidentiality except for the following situation:

– Suspected past or present abuse, neglect, or maltreatment of children, vulnerable adults, and elderly require me to report to legal authorities, child protection, and/or law enforcement information provided by the patient or other collateral sources.

– If the clinician has a reason to suspect the patient is in serious danger of harm to self or harm to others. This may include seeking out urgent services from Law Enforcement and notifying potential victims.

Good Faith Estimate

You have the right to receive a "Good Faith Estimate" explaining how much your medical care will cost. Under the law, mental health providers need to provide patients who are not using insurance an estimate of their bill for medical treatment. This includes the right to receive a Good Faith Estimate for the total expected cost of any non-emergency services. I will provide this to you in writing. For questions about your rights, visit www.cms.gov/nosurprises