Hosptial May be Liable for Chit-Chat in Bar

A hospital may be liable for one of its employees giving out confidential health information in a bar, an Illinois Appellate Court found.

Illini Community Hospital was sued by a patient after her positive pregnancy test was revealed to her twin sister by a hospital employee having drinks in a bar. The hospital filed a motion for summary judgment arguing that the disclosure was made by the employee acting outside the scope of her employment. The employee admitted that the hospital had instructed her about privacy of patient’s records. The employee resigned after the incident.

The court found that for the tort of invasion of privacy committed by an employee, the tort must be committed within the scope of employment. The court admitted that the “conduct at issue here, Young’s partial disclosure of plaintiff’s medical record, was not the kind she was employed to perform.” However, the court found that “because of the unique employment environment and the unique duties of the employees working in that environment that the traditional concepts concerning the scope of the master-servant relationship are difficult to apply.”

“An employee entrusted with confidential information in the course of his or her employment has a duty not to disclose the information-without limitation as to time or space. The duty not to do so is actuated by the needs and requirements of the employer. It was Young’s job, at all times and in all places, to refrain from unauthorized disclosures of patients’ medical information,” the court wrote. As a result, the court reversed the summary judgment for the hospital and remanded the case back to the trial court.

Suzanne Bagent v. Blessing Care Corporation, dba Illini Community Hospital and Misty Young, Fourth Dist., Illinois, March 3, 2006. No.4-05-0495, Bagent v Blessing Care