Stay on top of physical data breaches and drug diversion risks that threaten your healthcare organization with Senseon’s Physical Security Breach Roundup. We bring you the most recent physical data breach and drug diversion announcements each month.
Chief Pharmacists Makes off with 12,000 Doses of Medication
In the ongoing battle against drug diversion, another practitioner has been accused of theft. James F. Franks, former chief pharmacist at the Pennsylvania Soldiers & Sailors’ Home has been accused of stealing more than 12,000 doses of medication that included opioids and benzodiazepines while he was serving as the chief pharmacist at the institution.
Missing Document Leads to Breach
Seatle’s Bloodworks Northwest is in the process of notifying almost 1,900 patients of a data breach. The breach, which has been linked to a document that went missing on March 13, contained patient names, dates of birth, and diagnoses.
Florida Dental Practice Recovering After Employee Theft
All Smiles Dentistry in Port St. Lucie, FL is encouraging its patients to call the major credit bureaus for a free report after an employee was arrested on charges of identity theft. They are cooperating with authorities and providing a year of free credit monitoring to patients and guarantors whose information was accessed by the accused. (Notice available for download here.)
OCR Update
The Office of Civil Rights reports the following physical breaches:
- Inspira Behavioral Care report on 5/2, the theft of a desktop computer on that impacts 4,246 individuals.
- Youth Opportunity Center of Indiana reported on 5/14, the unauthorized access/disclosure of paper or files on that impacts 1,150 individuals.
- Health Net of California reported on 5/13, the unauthorized access/disclosure of paper or files that impacts 2,404 individuals.
- United Seating and Mobility LLC (dba Numotion) of Connecticut reported on 5/9, the theft of a laptop or other portable electronic device, and paper/films that impacts 3,578 patients.
HCV Outbreak Credited to Drug-Diverting Nurse
Back in 2018, an HCV outbreak was reported in the ED of a Washington State hospital. Today, authorities have found that it was likely due to unsafe injections from a nurse who had treated 13 patients. All of them were infected with HCV genotype 1a.
The outbreak was first noticed by authorities during routine surveillance who identified two cases of acute HCV infection in a 2-month window at the beginning of 2019. Neither patient exhibited the behavioral risk factors that are normally associated with new HCV infections. Investigators then found 10 more cases among patients treated in the ED.
Report Reveals That Clinical Drug Diversion Costs Organizations
A Protenus analysis of 324 drug diversion incidents found that one-third of reported incidents took place in a hospital or medical center setting. Doctors were responsible for 37 percent of diversion incidents and nurses were responsible for 30 percent. Across 29 incidents, organizations experienced an average monetary loss of $16.2 million.
Hospital Pharmacy Operations Report: Half of All Hospitals Experienced Drug Diversion
Kit Check’s 2018 Hospital Pharmacy Operations Report surveyed over 1,000 U.S. hospitals and found that 47% of respondents confirmed a drug diversion event in the previous six months. 80% reported an event in the past two years. At the same time, over 35% of respondents reported that they still don’t have a diversion response plan in place, while 45% said that the discovered event was identified by the manual investigation.
If you want to learn more about what you can do to minimize the risk of your facility ending up on this list, we can help.
