What Is the Legislation and Regulation Which Has the Greatest Impact on Health Care Ethics?

In the past years government has passed numerous laws and regulations which have impacted health care ethics. These laws and regulations include HIPAA, COBRA, FMLA, EMTALA and the law that provides your right to medical care despite whether or not you have insurance. Each of these has had a very important impact on health care ethics.

Here are several examples of legislation which have had a major impact on health care ethics. It is up to you and history to determine which has had the greatest impact.

HIPAA

• HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, was passed in order to protect a patient’s personal information regarding his medical conditions.
• Under this law, doctors and other medical care providers are prevented from sharing your private information with anyone.
• The HIPAA Privacy Rule also has developed a list of standards that all medical providers must live up to in order to protect your information electronically.
• The HIPAA Privacy Rule ensures that patients can rest easy when it comes to the public sharing of their private information.

COBRA

• COBRA, or the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, is a law that says when employees lose their jobs and lose their insurance coverage, they have the right to take advantage of this supplemental insurance for a certain period of time.
• This right is provided in order to ensure them that their insurance coverage will not lapse, which is important so that there is no disruption of medical coverage to the employee and their families.
• This must be offered to all employees who lose their job due to their own fault or no fault of their own, or who experience a reduction in the amount of hours they are used to working.
• It also must be offered to those who make move from one job to another, or who experience a death or divorce.
• Employers are required to inform their employees in these circumstances of their right to the continuation health care insurance covered offered by this law.

FMLA

• FMLA, or the Family Medical Leave Act, is a law that states an employee may leave his position in the workplace for an extended period of time with no pay to take care of a loved one who is sickly or gravely ill.
• The law guarantees the employee’s position or a similar position with no reduction in pay will be given back to him when he returns to work.
• The law allows employees to put family first without the risk of losing or having to quit their job.

EMTALA

• The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act legislates that medical professionals may not turn you away in an emergency situation simply due to a lack of insurance coverage or ability to pay for medical care.

As you can see, all of these laws and regulations have made an important impact on health care ethics. Which one is most important is a personal opinion and must be decided by you.