Basically are pharmacies required to obtained a legal waiver from a customer before revealing information like their present or past medications ?
Pharmacies in the US fall under HIPAA https://www.hipaajournal.com/hipaa-compliance-for-pharmacies/
Yes. It covers a broad range of healthcare providers.
Doctor/patient privilege and HIPAA are two different things. The OP is confusing the two.
I am not confusing the two. I am not asking about HIPAA
I am asking : Similar to the privilege afforded to Lawyer- Client, Spousal, doctor - patient, Clergy Penitent …. Is there similar legal privilege for pharmacist-patient ?
There is no doctor-patient privilege in Federal law, so it’s covered by 50 different state rules.
Either a patient or a physician may assert physician-patient privilege in the lawsuit. However, this privilege is one born of state statutes and is excluded from the Federal Rules of Evidence. As such, the rules governing physician-patient privilege may vary from state to state.
Physician-patient privilege differs from doctor-patient confidentiality, which protects a patient’s medical records and information outside of the context of a lawsuit. This protection is granted by state statutes and federal statutes, such as the HIPAA Privacy Act.
So Cornell school of law says this :
“ Common law does not recognize doctor-patient privilege, but the privilege exists in all jurisdictionsthrough statutory language.”
So the question is : When Doctor-Patient privilege exists in a jurisdiction through statutory language, does the same privilege extend to the pharmacy-patient relationship.
Once the answer is “state law dictates”, you can be nearly certain it is also, “and varies from state to state”.
Fair enough.
Take the doctor-patient part away.
Psychotherapist-Patient Privilege is a Federal privilege.
" In the landmark decision of Jaffe v. Redmond,11 the Supreme Court held that confidential communications between a licensed psychotherapist and her patients in the course of diagnosis or treatment are protected from compelled disclosure under FRE 501 ."
Under this privilege, can a patient expect the pharmacy to not disclose the medications prescribed to him/her ? [Do pharmacies fall under Psychotherapist-Patient privilege?](
The problem I think is that specific issue is covered by HIPPA so the privilege question is moot. A more appropriate scenario might be if I go to my pharmacist and say something that might end up in court like “I’m having impure thoughts about XXXXX. Can you talk to me about chemical castration.” Would THAT be covered under pharmacist-patient privilege?
No, pharmacists are not psychotherapists. Unless explicitly named by their specific license title as defined in that state’s law, statutes for other professionals don’t apply.
As an example, Oregon law names all of the licensees who are required to engage in mandated reporting under their broad license authority (e.g., health licensees). Who falls inder each of these titles (e.g., social worker) is defined elsewhere in statute. For many years, licensed psychologists were noy required to report elder abuse and neglect. Why? Because they had been left off the list when the statute was written or amended. Shouldn’t psychologists be mandated to report elder abuse? Yes. But were they? No, due to an omission.
So again, if state statute doesn’t name a licensed profession in a statute that lists the licensees to which it applies, it doesn’t apply even if the teo professions overlap in other functions.
thank you @susan
Yes, they are part of the “circle of care”. They can usually give information to doctors if for a relevant and necessary reason.