Question

You work for a​ hospital-owned EMS agency. Your boss tells you at shift change that the hospital is NOT doing well financially and that if a patient does NOT have insurance you should bypass your facility and take the patient to another hospital that is further away. If you bypass an appropriate hospital based on of a​ patient's ability to​ pay, you and the EMS agency could be held in violation​ of:

A.
HIPAA.
B.
sovereign doctrine.
C.
negligence.
D.
EMTALA.

Answer 1

EMTALA would be the violated regulation if an EMS agency bypassed a hospital based on a patient’s insurance status, as it mandates emergency treatment regardless of ability to pay.

Step-by-step explanation:

If you bypass an appropriate hospital based on a patient’s ability to pay, you and the EMS agency could be held in violation of EMTALA, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. Bypassing hospitals due to a patient's insurance status contravenes the EMTALA’s regulations, which state that anyone coming to an emergency department must be stabilized and treated, regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay.

The HIPAA, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, concerns the confidentiality of patient records and is not the violated regulation in this case. Sovereign doctrine is not applicable, and negligence refers to a failure to take proper care in doing something, which might also arise in this scenario but is not the primary legal issue at hand.