Since there are no (and I repeat NO) indications of HIPAA violations on ANY post in the blog, the plaintiffs have no leg to stand on there. They complain about decreased use of the hospital, but are pointing fingers at the wrong places, instead of who they see in the mirror. Besides the blog, people on the street also talk about what they've heard from folks who have gone there and may work there- will Essent go as far as to "shut them up" too? How far will they go to silence critics? Are they to resort to building a high wall around each facility, if not the community, and block all incoming information to filter out what they percieve as "bad" news? Will the employees be forced, blackmailed, and otherwise threatened into silence? WIll random beatings, injections of sodium pentathol, cameras everywhere, etc. be the order of the day at Essent facilities?

Here's an idea, radical though it may sound: Stop treating the employees as cannon fodder, the enemy, stray dogs you can beat to do your will. INstead, actually put effort into improving the environment of healthcare so that patients will have pleasant experiences, and prospective employees will beat the door down to get hired on, rather than to escape. Forget the Potemkin village-type tactics, and FIX WHAT NEEDS FIXED. Replace what cannot be fixed, upgrade as needed (and it's needed all over), give employees free reign to offer suggestions, rants (even worker bees need to blow off steam), etc.- employees can be a company's best resource if treated right.

Move EVERYTHING onto one campus, and raze the landlocked one (or sell it to someone to turn it into seomthing useful). Adding new buildings will be needed, but if it's needed, do it. There's plenty of room to grow on the north Loop area, and the facility out there is better laid out- it will need additions and some renovations, but it's a good core for a combined facility.

Better yet, since the present ownership has not provem themselves to either be effective administrators (three CEOs in 3 years, last three attempts to purchase new property failed) nor well-heeled (four out of five are in the red, and the one that isn't is barely breaking even), sell off PRMC to a firm that knows something about hospital administration and has been at it for quite a long time with success (unlike Essent, which, sadly, hasn't).

First the new ownership, then the other things need to take place. Then and only then will Paris have a hospital they can be proud of, and not made ther mad dash to Dallas, Greenville, Sherman/Denison, or Tyler for healthcare.

I hate to take anything away from the previous comment, but three out of the five hospitals are in the black--Sharon at $3.6M, Paris at $288k, and Neosha Valley at about a half-mill.

The rest of the statements I concur at face value. Christus was cutting spending considerably towards the end, and it showed. Essent has picked up the pace.

Midnite: HIPAA cuts a pretty wide, Draconian swath, so there's at least a hint of a HIPAA violation in one post I saw on the blog -- the post about the guy taking his mother to Baylor Heart Hospital in Plano for a pacemaker. If that guy was an employee, and the mother was a patient, and he didn't have a HIPAA-compliant authorization from mom to disclose the info, it could be a HIPAA violation (although I'd argue there's no identifying information, the discloser wasn't acting in his capacity as an employee at the time, the employee didn't get the PHI from the Hospital but from the patient, etc.). Still, though, that could theoretically be a violation. And I haven't read the complaint, but there might have been previous posts no longer there that were easier or more obvious cases. There's also no private cause of action (you can't sue somebody for violating HIPAA, only the DOJ can do that), so the claim should be structured as an argument that the employee caused the Hospital to violate HIPAA via his/her actions. I'd love to see the court explore that some.

Just remember that the lawsuit has generated a court order for an ISP to provide an address of a customer, thus negating the expectation of anonymity.

There have been no criminal charges filed, so how is the justification built on a section of the codes that deals with revealing identities if a criminal trial requires it.

The so-called HIPAA violation was used as a smokescreen to get the judge to sign off on an order: But HHS is the one that determines if prosecution is appropriate, not Essent. And the DOJ would be the ones doing it, not Wes Tidwell.

All in all, one might say that an external law firm came up with a marginal scheme to circumvent the intent of the law, which could have far reaching effects on privacy and free speech.

Jeff,
Will throw one back at you: Which hospital would he have to be an employee of? Then, since he received information not as a covered entity, would it apply?

If so, there are numerous violations every day from visitors that are in the healthcare field, letting friends know that they should visit a relative or friend in the hospital. Shall we contemplate that?