HSE 340 Milestone One Guidelines and Rubric The final project for this course is the creation of a case review. As a human services practitioner, you could be in a position that requires you to review medical records and to be aware of all related federal and state laws and statutes, healthcare mandates, codes of ethics, and credentialing requirements (e.g., the Joint Commission for Accrediting Hospital Organizations [JCAHO], which governs most hospitals). You will be reviewing a case study to determine what legal and ethical issues need to be considered when deciding if it is appropriate to divulge the information requested. In this milestone, you will write an introduction to the provided case study, with Milestone Two being the actual case review. Up to this point, the modules in this course have assisted you in learning the basics of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and protected health information (PHI). In your role as a human services professional (HSP), ethics related to confidentiality of PHI will be extremely important. As you continue to learn about PHI and its impact on human services work in this course, you will learn about legal issues that can arise from ethical standards not being followed. Be sure to access the articles provided in the module resources, in addition to the textbook, to obtain supplementary content that will assist you with this assignment. Discharge planning is the main function for the final project, so keep that in mind as you read about implications of insufficient discharge protocols. Consider the following scenario. Stephanie is a human-services policy analyst who works with the state-run psychiatric hospital system. Her job is to facilitate discharges of patients to the community by coordinating with local mental-health centers and providers of care to make sure that the patient has adequate and immediate post-discharge care. Stephanie received a call from a parole officer of a 25-year-old illegal-immigrant patient named Kevin, who was in the hospital. The parole officer indicated that Kevin violated parole by abusing illegal substances prior to the admission to the state hospital. The parole officer asked questions about Kevin’s diagnoses, where he was being discharged to, and the staff involved in his care while hospitalized. You have been asked to determine if Stephanie can legally and ethically answer these questions and provide confidential health information about Kevin to the parole officer. For this milestone, you will submit a draft of the introduction, including all critical elements listed below. Review the Ethical Standards for Human Services Professionals. Analyze the codes of ethics that relate to the release of health information and how they correlate with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996. Include the major legal concerns that have arisen by allowing the release of health information. Review hospital-specific legal and ethical considerations when releasing confidential patient information to other providers of care upon discharge from a hospital. Conduct an analysis of the challenges faced by agencies holding health information experience and how these issues are commonly resolved. Review strategies used by other large health and human services agencies to prevent legal suits being brought against them.

Specifically, the following critical elements must be addressed: I. Introduction: Codes of Ethics and Legal Considerations in Human Services Practices Review and analyze the codes of ethics and legal considerations within the human services field. A. What codes of ethics relate to the release of health information in the human services field? Include your rationale for how you determined which codes apply. B. What legal concerns relate to the release of health information? Use citations to substantiate your claims. C. What are some of the ramifications for inappropriately releasing confidential information about a patient or client in a hospital setting? D. What challenges does a program/agency/hospital experience in relation to the codes of ethics and legal issues? E. If a case with health services aspects involved were to go to court, what legal aspects are to be considered? Include other issues that should be considered by agencies or hospitals to ensure compliance when releasing healthcare and other confidential information. Guidelines for Submission: Milestone One must be submitted as a one- to two-page Microsoft Word document with double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, one-inch margins, and at least three sources cited in APA format.