DETROIT – The Detroit Medical Center (DMC) announced Thursday it has sent letters to 1,529 patients informing them of a protected health information breach.
The unauthorized access of information affected patients seen at a DMC facility between March 2015 and May 2016. A staffing agency contracted by DMC notified hospital leadership that one of the agency’s employees provided protected health information to unauthorized individuals not affiliated with the DMC organization.
The DMC said it has since filed a complaint with law enforcement concerning the theft of records by the agency staff member and is cooperating fully with ongoing police investigation.
The protection of patient information is of the utmost importance to DMC, the healthcare system said in a statement. Once aware of the breach, hospital administration took the following actions:
- Reviewed all electronic health records with which the agency employee had access;
- Terminated its relationship with the agency employee as well as the individual’s access to all DMC computer systems; and
- Implemented changes to monitoring programs in order to prevent future breaches.
"Hospital officials deeply regret this situation has occurred," a statement from the DMC reads.
DMC has offered the affected patients credit monitoring through ALLClear ID Alert Network at no cost to them and provided them with a hotline number 888-362-3370 if they have questions or would like more information.
Sign up for ClickOnDetroit breaking news alerts and email newsletters