This notice describes how medical information about you may be used and disclosed, and how you can get access to this information. Please review it carefully.
Federal law (HIPAA) requires Haywood Family Eye Care to protect the privacy of your health information, give you this notice of our legal duties and privacy practices, and follow the terms of the notice currently in effect. This document explains, in plain English, how we handle your medical information and the rights you have over it.
How we use and disclose your health information
Most of the time, we use your health information to take care of you and to run the practice. The categories below describe the routine uses that don't require your specific permission.
Treatment
We use and share your information to provide eye care — exams, diagnoses, treatments, prescriptions, and referrals. For example, your optometrist may share your records with the ophthalmologist performing your cataract surgery, or with your primary care physician managing your diabetes. We share what's needed to coordinate your care, and no more.
Payment
We use your information to bill you and your insurance for the services you receive. That includes sending claims to your insurance company, verifying coverage, and following up on unpaid balances.
Health care operations
We use your information to run the practice well — staff training, quality reviews, compliance audits, scheduling, appointment reminders, and similar internal activities. For example, we might use your record to evaluate how we did, or to train a new technician on proper documentation.
Required by law
We will disclose information when a federal, state, or local law requires us to do so.
Public health
We may share information with public health authorities to prevent or control disease, report births and deaths, report reactions to medications or product problems, or notify a person who may have been exposed to a communicable disease.
Mandatory reporting
North Carolina law requires healthcare providers to report suspected abuse, neglect, or domestic violence involving children, elderly adults, or vulnerable adults. We comply with those obligations.
Law enforcement and legal proceedings
We may release information in response to a court order, subpoena, warrant, or other lawful process, and to law enforcement officials under certain limited circumstances permitted by HIPAA.
Business associates
We work with outside companies that help us run the practice — billing services, electronic health record providers, IT support, scheduling software, and similar vendors. These "business associates" are bound by written agreements to protect your information to the same standards we do.
Appointment reminders and follow-up
We may contact you by phone, text, email, or mail to remind you about appointments, follow up after a visit, or share information about your care.
Uses that require your written authorization
Some uses of your health information require your explicit, written permission. You can revoke an authorization at any time, in writing — though we cannot take back any disclosures we have already made in reliance on it. The following always require your authorization:
- Marketing. We will not use your information to send you marketing communications about other companies' products or services without your written permission. (Reminders about your own care and information about practice services are not marketing.)
- Sale of your information. We do not sell health information. If we ever proposed to, we would need your specific written authorization.
- Psychotherapy notes. If your record included separately kept psychotherapy notes, those would require special authorization to disclose. (As an optometry practice, we generally do not maintain these.)
- Other uses not described in this notice. Anything outside the categories above requires your written authorization.
Your rights
HIPAA gives you specific rights over your health information. We honor them, and we'll help you exercise them.
Right to access your record
You can inspect and request a copy of your health record. Submit a written request to our Privacy Officer; we will respond within 30 days. We may charge a reasonable fee for copies.
Right to amend
If you believe something in your record is incorrect or incomplete, you can ask us to amend it. We may deny the request in certain limited situations (for example, if we did not create the record), but we will explain our reasoning in writing if we do.
Right to an accounting of disclosures
You can request a list of certain disclosures of your information that we have made over the past six years — excluding routine disclosures for treatment, payment, or operations. The first list each year is free; additional requests may incur a fee.
Right to request restrictions
You can ask us to restrict how we use or disclose your information for treatment, payment, or operations. We are not required to agree, except in one situation: if you pay out of pocket in full for a service and ask us not to share that information with your insurance, we must honor that request.
Right to confidential communications
You can ask us to contact you in a specific way — for example, only on your cell phone, or only at a particular address. We will accommodate reasonable requests.
Right to a paper copy of this notice
You are entitled to a paper copy of this notice at any time, even if you originally agreed to receive it electronically. Just ask at the front desk.
Right to be notified of a breach
If the privacy of your information is ever breached, we are required to notify you.
Right to complain
You have the right to file a complaint if you believe your privacy rights have been violated. See the complaints section below — we will not retaliate against you for filing one.
Our obligations
We are required by law to:
- Maintain the privacy of your health information.
- Provide you with this notice of our duties and privacy practices.
- Follow the terms of the notice currently in effect.
- Notify you in the event of a breach of your unsecured health information.
- Train our staff in privacy practices and hold them accountable.
We reserve the right to change this notice and to make the new terms apply to all health information we maintain. When we make material changes, we will post the revised notice in our office and on this website.
How to file a complaint
If you believe we have violated your privacy rights, you can file a complaint in either of two places — or both. We won't penalize you for doing so, and we want to know if something has gone wrong.
With our office
Contact our Privacy Officer (details below). You can call, email, or send a written complaint. We will investigate and respond.
With the federal government
You can also file a complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights:
- Online: hhs.gov/ocr/complaints
- Mail: 200 Independence Avenue SW, Room 509F, HHH Building, Washington, DC 20201
- Phone: 1-877-696-6775
Privacy Officer contact
Any questions about this notice, requests to exercise your rights, or concerns about how we handle your information should go to our Privacy Officer:
- Privacy Officer: Miranda Hoffman, Office Manager
- Email: privacy@haywoodfamilyeye.com
- Phone: (828) 456-8361
- Mail: Haywood Family Eye Care, 1604 Sulphur Springs Rd, Waynesville, NC 28786