Civil Rights and Conscience
File a Civil Rights and Conscience Complaint
If you believe that a Civil Rights covered entity discriminated against you or someone else because of your or someone’s race, color, national origin, disability, age, sex, or religion in violation of federal civil rights laws under HHS jurisdiction or has otherwise violated federal provider conscience laws, you may file a Civil Rights and Conscience complaint with OCR. A Civil Rights covered entity includes programs or activities that receive federal financial assistance from HHS and may include programs or activities that HHS directly operates and programs or activities that receive federal assistance from HHS. For complaints alleging disability discrimination, a covered entity may also include services, programs, or activities operated by a state and local governmental agency and its political subdivisions. You may file a Civil Rights and Conscience complaint for yourself or for someone else. The following are some examples of potential covered entities (including institutions and personnel) that must abide by federal civil rights laws: - State and local government agencies that are responsible for administering health care
- State and local government income assistance and human services agencies
- Hospitals
- Medicaid and Medicare Providers
- Physicians and other health care professionals in private practice with patients assisted by Medicaid
- Family health centers
- Community mental health centers
- Alcohol and drug treatment centers
- Nursing homes
- Foster care homes
- Public and private adoption and foster care agencies
- Day care centers
- Senior citizen centers
- Senior and Infant nutrition programs
- Any entity established under the Affordable Care Act, including State and Federal Health Insurance Exchanges
- Health insurance plans or companies
- HMOs
- Pharmacies
- Homeless shelters
- Health researchers
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Health Information Privacy
File a Health Information Privacy Complaint
File a Security Rule Violation Complaint
If you believe that a HIPAA covered entity or business associate violated the Privacy, Security, or Breach Notification Rules (the HIPAA Rules), you may file a Health Information Privacy & Security complaint with OCR. OCR can investigate complaints alleging violations of the HIPAA Rules against HIPAA covered entities and their business associates. You may file a Health Information Privacy & Security complaint for yourself or for someone else. The following are HIPAA covered entities that must meet the requirements of the Federal Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Rules: - Health Plans
- Health care clearinghouses
- Health care providers that conduct a portion of their business electronically using a HIPAA covered transaction
A HIPAA business associate is a person or entity that creates, receives, maintains, or transmits protected health information on behalf of a covered entity for a covered function, or provides certain services to or for such covered entity where the provision of the services includes the disclosure of protected health information. The following are some examples of potential HIPAA business associates: - Other covered entities
- Law firms or lawyers who represent HIPAA covered entities
- Secure document shredding/disposal services
- Cloud service, server, and other IT service providers
- Interpreter or translation service providers.
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