University of Rochester Medical Center officials this week sent letters to hundreds of former patients, alerting them that the center lost protected information.
A resident physician misplaced a computer flash drive that contained protected health information of 537 former orthopaedic patients, according to a news release from URMC. The USB flash drive was used to transport copied information to study and ultimately improve surgical results.
UMRC officials said it appeared that the flash drive was misplaced at an outpatient orthopaedic facility. Hospital officials said employees conducted an “exhaustive but unproductive search” and believe the flash drive was destroyed in the laundry.
Medical Center officials stressed that the missing flash drive did not contain original files, but included copied information. The loss should not affect follow-up care for any of the involved patients, according to URMC.
Patients’ addresses, social security information and insurance information were not on the now-missing flash drive.
Information included the patients’ names, gender, age, date of birth, weight, phone number and internal record numbers. The files also included physicians’ names, date of service, diagnosis, diagnosis study procedure and any complications the patient may have had.
Source:
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20130503/NEWS01/305030047/missing-flash-drive-at-urmc?nclick_check=1