Privacy Policy

This notice describes how health information about you may be used and disclosed and how you can get access to this information. Please review it carefully.

RED HOUSE BEHAVIOR RESOURCES – NOTICE OF PRIVACY PRACTICES

If you have any questions about this Notice please contact our Privacy Officer: Josy McEldowney at 888-362-3970

This Notice of Privacy Practices describes how we may use and disclose your protected health information to carry out treatment, payment or health care operations and for other purposes that are permitted or required by law. It also describes your rights to access and control your protected health information. “Protected health information” is information about you, including demographic information, that may identify you and that relates to your past, present or future physical or mental health or condition and related health care services.

We are required to abide by the terms of this Notice of Privacy Practices. We may change the terms of our notice, at any time. The new notice will be effective for all protected health information that we maintain at that time. Upon your request, we will provide you with any revised Notice of Privacy Practices. You may request a revised version by accessing our website, or calling the office and requesting that a revised copy be sent to you in the mail.

How We Collect Information About You

Red House Behavior Resources (RHBR) and its employees and consultants collect data through a variety of means including but not necessarily limited to letters, phone calls, emails, voice mails, and from the submission of assessments or reports that are either required by law, or necessary to provide services or other requests for assistance through our organization.

What We Do Not Do With Your Information

Information about your financial situation and medical conditions and care that you provide to us in writing, via email, on the phone (including information left on voice mails), contained in or attached to reports and assessments, or directly or indirectly given to us, is held in strictest confidence.

We do not give out, exchange, barter, rent, sell, lend, or disseminate any information about applicants or clients who apply for or actually receive our services that is considered patient confidential, is restricted by law, or has been specifically restricted by a patient/client in a signed HIPAA consent form.

How We Do Use Your Information

Information is only used as is reasonably necessary to process your benefits or to provide you with health or Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) services which may require communication between RHBR and health care providers, medical product or service providers, insurance companies, and other providers necessary to: verify your medical information is accurate; verify your insurance benefits; determine the type of health care services you need including, but not limited to ABA; or to obtain or purchase any type of medical supplies, devices, medications, or insurance.

If you apply or attempt to apply to receive assistance through us and provide information with the intent or purpose of fraud or that results in either an actual crime of fraud for any reason including willful or un-willful acts of negligence whether intended or not, or in any way demonstrates or indicates attempted fraud, your non-medical information can be given to legal authorities including police, investigators, courts, and/or attorneys or other legal professionals, as well as any other information as permitted by law.

Information We Do Not Collect

We do not use cookies on our website to collect date from our site visitors. We do not collect information about site visitors unless they fill out our contact form. We do use some affiliate programs that may or may not capture traffic date through our site. To avoid potential data capture that may occur if you visited an outside website simply do not click on any of our outside affiliate links.

Information Collected from Children

Red House does not knowingly collect information from children under 13. You must be at least 13 years old to use this website (see U.S. Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act).

Limited Right to Use Non-Identifying Personal Information From Biographies, Letters, Notes, and Other Sources

Any pictures, stories, letters, biographies, correspondence, or thank you notes sent to us become the exclusive property of RHBR. We reserve the right to use non-identifying information about our clients (those who receive services or goods from or through us) for promotional purposes that are directly related to our mission.

Clients will not be compensated for use of this information and no identifying information (photos, addresses, phone numbers, contact information, last names or uniquely identifiable names) will be used without client’s express advance permission.

You may specifically request that NO information be used whatsoever for promotional purposes, but you must identify any requested restrictions in writing. We respect your right to privacy and assure you no identifying information or photos that you send to us will ever be publicly used without your direct or indirect consent.

USES AND DISCLOSURES OF PROTECTED HEALTH INFORMATION

Your protected health information may be used and disclosed by your provider, our office staff and others outside of our office who are involved in your care and treatment for the purpose of providing health care services to you. Your protected health information may also be used and disclosed to pay your health care bills and within the organization to support the operation of Red House Behavior Resources.

Following are examples of the types of uses and disclosures of your protected health information that your health care provider’s office is permitted to make. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive, but to describe the types of uses and disclosures that may be made by our office.

Treatment

We will use and disclose your protected health information to provide, coordinate, or manage your ABA treatment and any related services. This includes the coordination or management of your health care with another provider. For example, we would disclose your protected health information, as necessary, to a home health agency that provides care to you. We will also disclose protected health information to other physicians who may be treating you. For example, your protected health information may be provided to a physician to whom you have been referred to ensure that the physician has the necessary information to diagnose or treat you. In addition, we may disclose your protected health information from time-to-time to another physician or health care provider (e.g., a specialist or laboratory) who, at the request of your physician, becomes involved in your care by providing assistance with your health care diagnosis or treatment to your physician.

Payment

Your protected health information will be used and disclosed, as needed, to obtain payment for your health care services provided by us or by another provider. This may include certain activities that your health insurance plan may undertake before it approves or pays for the health care services we recommend for you such as: making a determination of eligibility or coverage for insurance benefits, reviewing services provided to you for medical necessity, and undertaking utilization review activities. For example, obtaining approval for an assessment may require that your relevant protected health information be disclosed to the health plan to obtain approval for the assessment.

Health Care Operations

We may use or disclose, as needed, your protected health information in order to support the business activities of Red House Behavior Resources. These activities include, but are not limited to, quality assessment activities, employee review activities, training of behavior therapists, and conducting or arranging for other business activities.

We will share your protected health information with third party “business associates” that perform various activities (for example, billing or transcription services) for our practice. Whenever an arrangement between our office and a business associate involves the use or disclosure of your protected health information, we will have a written contract that contains terms that will protect the privacy of your protected health information.

Other Permitted and Required Uses and Disclosures That May Be Made Without Your Authorization or Opportunity to Agree or Object

We may use or disclose your protected health information in the following situations without your authorization or providing you the opportunity to agree or object. These situations include:

Required By Law

We may use or disclose your protected health information to the extent that the use or disclosure is required by law. The use or disclosure will be made in compliance with the law and will be limited to the relevant requirements of the law. You will be notified, if required by law, of any such uses or disclosures.

Health Oversight

We may disclose protected health information to a health oversight agency for activities authorized by law, such as audits, investigations, and inspections. Oversight agencies seeking this information include government agencies that oversee the health care system, government benefit programs, other government regulatory programs and civil rights laws.

Abuse or Neglect

We may disclose your protected health information to a public health authority that is authorized by law to receive reports of child abuse or neglect. In addition, we may disclose your protected health information if we believe that you have been a victim of abuse, neglect or domestic violence to the governmental entity or agency authorized to receive such information. In this case, the disclosure will be made consistent with the requirements of applicable federal and state laws.

Legal Proceedings

We may disclose protected health information in the course of any judicial or administrative proceeding, in response to an order of a court or administrative tribunal (to the extent such disclosure is expressly authorized), or in certain conditions in response to a subpoena, discovery request or other lawful process.

Research Purposes

We may disclose your protected health information subject to a special review process and the confidentiality requirements of state and federal law.

Uses and Disclosures of Protected Health Information Based upon Your Written Authorization

Other uses and disclosures of your protected health information will be made only with your written authorization, unless otherwise permitted or required by law as described above. You may revoke this authorization in writing at any time. If you revoke your authorization, we will no longer use or disclose your protected health information for the reasons covered by your written authorization. Please understand that we are unable to take back any disclosures already made with your authorization.

Other Permitted and Required Uses and Disclosures That Require Providing You the Opportunity to Agree or Object

We may use and disclose your protected health information in the following instances. You have the opportunity to agree or object to the use or disclosure of all or part of your protected health information. If you are not present or able to agree or object to the use or disclosure of the protected health information, then your provider may, using professional judgement, determine whether the disclosure is in your best interest.

Others Involved in Your Health Care or Payment for your Care

Unless you object, we may disclose to a member of your family, a relative, a close friend or any other person you identify, your protected health information that directly relates to that person’s involvement in your health care. If you are unable to agree or object to such a disclosure, we may disclose such information as necessary if we determine that it is in your best interest based on our professional judgment.

YOUR RIGHTS

Following is a statement of your rights with respect to your protected health information and a brief description of how you may exercise these rights.

You have the right to inspect and copy your protected health information.

This means you may inspect and obtain a copy of protected health information about you for so long as we maintain the protected health information. You may obtain your medical record that contains medical and billing records and any other records that your provider and the practice uses for making decisions about you. As permitted by federal or state law, we may charge you a reasonable copy fee for a copy of your records.

Under federal law, however, you may not inspect or copy the following records: psychotherapy notes; information compiled in reasonable anticipation of, or use in, a civil, criminal, or administrative action or proceeding; and laboratory results that are subject to law that prohibits access to protected health information. Depending on the circumstances, a decision to deny access may be reviewable. In some circumstances, you may have a right to have this decision reviewed. Please contact our Privacy Officer if you have questions about access to your medical record.

You have the right to request a restriction of your protected health information.

This means you may ask us not to use or disclose any part of your protected health information for the purposes of treatment, payment or health care operations. You may also request that any part of your protected health information not be disclosed to family members or friends who may be involved in your care or for notification purposes as described in this Notice of Privacy Practices. Your request must state the specific restriction requested and to whom you want the restriction to apply.

Your provider is not required to agree to a restriction that you may request. If your provider does agree to the requested restriction, we may not use or disclose your protected health information in violation of that restriction unless it is needed to provide emergency treatment. With this in mind, please discuss any restriction you wish to request with your physician. You may request a restriction by contacting our Privacy Officer.

You have the right to request to receive confidential communications from us by alternative means or at an alternative location.

We will accommodate reasonable requests. We may also condition this accommodation by asking you for information as to how payment will be handled or specification of an alternative address or other method of contact. We will not request an explanation from you as to the basis for the request. Please make this request in writing to our Privacy Officer.

You may have the right to have your provider amend your protected health information.

This means you may request an amendment of protected health information about you in a designated record set for so long as we maintain this information. In certain cases, we may deny your request for an amendment. If we deny your request for amendment, you have the right to file a statement of disagreement with us and we may prepare a rebuttal to your statement and will provide you with a copy of any such rebuttal. Please contact our Privacy Officer if you have questions about amending your medical record.

You have the right to receive an accounting of certain disclosures we have made, if any, of your protected health information.

This right applies to disclosures for purposes other than treatment, payment or health care operations as described in this Notice of Privacy Practices. It excludes disclosures we may have made to you if you authorized us to make the disclosure, to family members or friends involved in your care, or for notification purposes, to law enforcement (as provided in the privacy rule) or correctional facilities, as part of a limited data set disclosure. You have the right to receive specific information regarding these disclosures. The right to receive this information is subject to certain exceptions, restrictions and limitations.

You have the right to obtain a paper copy of this notice from us, upon request, even if you have agreed to accept this notice electronically.

COMPLAINTS

You may complain to us or to the Secretary of Health and Human Services if you believe your privacy rights have been violated by us. You may file a complaint with us by notifying our Privacy Officer of your complaint. We will not retaliate against you for filing a complaint.

You may contact our Privacy Officer, Josy McEldowney at 888-362-3970 or josy@redhousebehavior.com for further information about the complaint process.

This notice was published and becomes effective on September 1, 2022.