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There has been for at least 30 years. https://www.mib.com/request_yo... Serious illnesses will show up on that record, and, while this is not supposed to be legal, bigger companies will be MUCH less likely to hire you if you have or recently have had one.

The parent is talking about the Medical Information Bureau - MIB - notice the bullshit in the gray box.

With MIB, Lexis Nexus, Acxiom, credit bureaus and government collecting information about us, we are living in a corporate state that would make an East German Stasi agent cream his pants.

The Medical Information Bureau?

They don't want you to forget. They want to discourage you from making any health insurance claims or even trying to get health insurance because of all of your "pre-existing" conditions.

"Sick? NO INSURANCE FOR YOU!"

"But, but, but, I had health insurance at my last job, they laid me off, I was on COBRA but I couldn't afford it anymore, and I then got a new job that doesn't have any medical insurance so I have to get my own - and I can't get it because I have a "pre-existing" condition?! I'm sick!"

"Sorry for the inconvenience."

The Free Market working as it should!

This will screw up my healthcare for the rest of my life! Makeing all of these errored stupid databases cross link will do far worse than this.

She is now treated well but forever she will be DX Epileptic even though it is completely wrong

Have you checked the MIB to see if both of you have those entries? If they are there, dispute them.

For those those don't know, the MIB is yet another company that collects data on us to report to subscribers who want to know about your health care history.

You gave them permission to use that information when you signed the patient information form at the doctors office in order to get treatment.

do too. I'm guessing also that parents aren't beating their children (spanking) or rinsing their mouth out (with liquid dish soap) as much either.

Yeah, old fashioned family values - the cure for society's ills - NOT.

The child grows up thinking that physical violence is normal. They'll grow up thinking the showing anger and rage is normal. Then they'll be in school and in the workforce and they'll wonder why they can't get along with others or worse, they'll end up in jail. They'll have employment problems all their life and hiring mangers will never give them feedback so they'll be going through life wondering what the fuck is wrong with everyone.

The kid will grow up with anxiety and depression - and we wonder why anti-depressants and anti-anxiety drugs are blockbuster drugs. And hopefully, the depression will get them to seek help before they do something like climb up into a bell tower and start shooting innocent people. Of course with the stigma on mental health, the person will have to pay cash to keep the shit out of the MIB - or at least the best they can - because employers look at it and if you have a mental health history, you become unemployable.

More than likely, the child will grow up feeling unease and purposeless while trying to fill the void with consumption (racking up the credit cards), prescription drugs and alcohol.

You sir have spelled out the source of many of our society's ills.

In Canada patients and health care professionals have client/doctor confidentiality similar to client / lawyer confidentiality.

You gotta be fucking kidding. Absolutely not. Get a lawyer on the the stand and try to force him to testify - you can't. The only thing a lawyer can disclose is if you told them about plans for a future crime.

Get a doctor on the stand and they will be compelled by the judge to say all sorts of things.

Even when they're not in court a doctor is obliged to disclose all sorts of things. All sorts of diseases like aids, STDs, cancer, measles and other things are reported to public health by law. With a child, sometimes the school is notified.

Doctors report all sorts of things to the insurance industry. The Medical Insurance Bureau collects and tabulates the information and sells it to the insurance industry, to prevent fraud and price your insurance appropriately. The MIB has been doing this since the 1900s. Yes, close to a century. Bet you never heard of them!

If you are medically unable to drive, the doctor is required to notify the government so that they yank your driver's license.

Medical records are routinely turned over to the government for medical billing and random audits.

My spouse is a physician, and you wouldn't believe the lax IT security most hospitals use for medical records. It's appalling, so much so that I'm strongly against electronic medical records.

A doctor's office would lose it's practice if it handed over information to anyone without the patient's consent.

Again, haha, not true.

While it might not apply to your single-test request, Medical Tourism might help. In your case, for less than the total cost you mention you might be able to fly or drive to a nearby country and get the same test, but in a way that you own the results. More commonly, medical tourism is used to either get an extensive set of medical tests done for a fraction of the U.S. cost (if you could get your HMO to authorize the set in the first place), or to get specific surgeries or dental procedures done for far less than the U.S. cost.

The well-known m.t. hospitals have the same equipment and safety standards as U.S. hospitals, but much cheaper prices. Plus you get your own data and the hospital room is like a resort hotel, sometimes with beach nearby.

As examples, a friend needed $20,000 worth of dental work done (as estimated by U.S. dentists). His total cost was less than $5,000 in Costa Rica (including plane tix: Costa Rica is known for dental m.t.), plus he got some ecotourism time in the rain forests. Several of the m.t. hospitals in Thailand and elsewhere have had their business skyrocket after 2001: families who used to visit the U.S. for their yearly checkups (Mayo clinic or similar) aren't being allowed into the U.S. (i.e. a drop of 40% from Middle Eastern countries. Stop the most U.S. friendly people in these countries from seeing their long-term doctors and keep their money away from U.S. businesses: great PR and great economic planning, with no appreciable safety benefits. ).

M.T. also allows you to truthfully say you're going off for a vacation when you're going to get elective surgery like liposuction or plastic surgery done. On your return you'll get "Hey, you look better...nice tan."

Individual insurance can't cover the needs of many people, so most rely on "group insurance". This isn't really insurance, though, because the providers aren't doing the homework to see who's a risk an who's not. They just close their eyes and accept the whole group. Kind of like a mini corporate-sponsored commune.

This is absolutely false. There is a credit reporting agency which tracks your medical history, and it is used for determining if you qualify or not for health insurance as well as life insurance. Some states like New York do not allow companies to reject applicants however.

Check it out

Scary stuff.

I have been rejected for health insurance before because of data in their database.

This IS what happens.

go check out the Medical Insurance Board

I was just rejected for health insurance because I went to a doctor for valium after quitting using heroin. It was six years ago when I was 23. Never needed to see a shrink, or a counseler, or any other sort of medical person. I got generic valium which would have cost me less than $50 if I had known it would be on my permanent record. Anyway, used it for two weeks to help with the anxiety of withdrawal and that was it.

Now, I got laid off from my job and don't want to spend $370 a month for CORBA. I have no choice. Couldn't even get insurance with a $5000 deductable. I have been rejected by every single insurance company (and there are really only about seven that sell individual plans).

Yeah, I know I fucked up. But does this disqualify me from all health insurance, even a $5000 deductable? That is hard to accept.

Large databases with diverse pieces of personal information one database with inadequate protection are just too attractive a target -- 500,000 social security numbers? The amount of money identity thieves can make from the sale of those ssns, and the damage done to individuals, is staggering. But will there be any penalty beyond a slap on the wrist for insufficient security?

To clear up a few misconceptions that I've seen from the posts:

HIPAA is now worded in such a way that it allows health care providers (and other "covered entities") to share medical information about a patient without consent for a number of reasons. The result is that information in your file may be shared with others without you ever finding out. The best place I've found for information on HIPAA is at the Health Privacy Project . Go to their page and do a search on "HIPAA" and you will find out everything you ever wanted to know about HIPAA.

HIPAA makes it easier to circulate information once gathered, but it is not itself a storage system. For a huge storage system, go check out the Medical Information Bureau (MIB) web site. They have a FAQ about what they do, what medical information they store, and who they share it with. MIB exists to prevent fraud (a good thing), but I'd sure like to know what their security is like.

Finally, for another reason to repeal HIPAA and decentralize information, read about the "Emergency Health Powers Act". Again, designed for good reasons, but could be applied in very heavy-handed ways. The Health Powers Act specifically shields companies from liability.

Large databases with diverse pieces of personal information one database with inadequate protection are just too attractive a target -- 500,000 social security numbers? The amount of money identity thieves can make from the sale of those ssns, and the damage done to individuals, is staggering. But will there be any penalty beyond a slap on the wrist for insufficient security?

To clear up a few misconceptions that I've seen from the posts:

HIPAA is now worded in such a way that it allows health care providers (and other "covered entities") to share medical information about a patient without consent for a number of reasons. The result is that information in your file may be shared with others without you ever finding out. The best place I've found for information on HIPAA is at the Health Privacy Project . Go to their page and do a search on "HIPAA" and you will find out everything you ever wanted to know about HIPAA.

HIPAA makes it easier to circulate information once gathered, but it is not itself a storage system. For a huge storage system, go check out the Medical Information Bureau (MIB) web site. They have a FAQ about what they do, what medical information they store, and who they share it with. MIB exists to prevent fraud (a good thing), but I'd sure like to know what their security is like.

Finally, for another reason to repeal HIPAA and decentralize information, read about the "Emergency Health Powers Act". Again, designed for good reasons, but could be applied in very heavy-handed ways. The Health Powers Act specifically shields companies from liability.

"Think of all the medical and financial information that insurance companies have about the people that they insure. People should be more worried that somebody is going to hack into Prudential's database. Frankly, my medical records are a lot more private to me than the books that I buy online."

first of all, invasion of privacy.

second of all, what other tests will be run, stored, and later passed on to other agencies at MIB.

Thanks, but no thanks, I really don't even like my employer taking a urine sample once every few years for random drug tests, but I do it simply because I like my job.

I used to sell life insurance. Your medical records are available via a centralized facility called the Medical Information Bureau. It is used to check to see if (for example) an applicant is lying when he claims to not smoke before issuing a policy.

Yes, we needed your signature to release the information but the point is that the information is already being stored in a centrally accessible fashion.

This isn't robots collecting DNA samples (yet) but you should know that when a medical test is ordered, a lot of other information is collected along the way. Blood tests in particular test for a set of things at the same time. All that information is centrally accessible.

The only way I can think of in order to maintain traditional privacy would be to live in the woods as a hermit. Even then, it's too late because you left a trail of data as a child.

A lot more interesting information on this is here.