What is your policy on giving patient info over the phone?

What is your facilities policy on giving information to family/friends over the phone? Do you have the patient/family set up a password or use some other way in order to be sure that is someone who should really be receiving info? I am on a work group for our facility to write a housewide policy. Currently each floor seems to be doing something different which causes problems if a patient gets transferred to another floor or if they have a future stay on a different floor. Any info would be great!
Callers are informed we are not allow to provide information over the phone and are encouraged to call whoever is the designated family spoke person (if for whatever reason patient unable to take call). If the patient is able to take the call...just ask the patient.

Quote from Nccity2002Callers are informed we are not allow to provide information over the phone and are encouraged to call whoever is the designated family spoke person (if for whatever reason patient unable to take call). If the patient is able to take the call...just ask the patient.

On admission a person should be identified as the spokeperson in case of emergencies, especially if a patient is unable to communcate (ideally spouses,parents, or whoevere has the DPA). We make it clear on admission (and in writing) that we DO NOT provide phone information. If the caller is the designated spoke person, you can set up a system where she/he can povide the patient's ss#, or some other form of password. Usually, once the caller is informed that by law we are unable to provide info, they are very understadning.

We give the parents ( I work with kids) a passcode and only to them. We inform them that this is only given to them and if someone calls and has this number we know that whomever is callng can receive any medical information. So we tell the parents or guardian to only keep it to themselves.

One hospital I worked used the last 4 digits of the account number. Worked great, as there was never any confusion as to where to look for the code.

Quote from RNNPICUWe give the parents ( I work with kids) a passcode and only to them. We inform them that this is only given to them and if someone calls and has this number we know that whomever is callng can receive any medical information. So we tell the parents or guardian to only keep it to themselves.

We don't have a password or anything at my work but I do think it would be a great idea! It would make things much easier and clearer.

We too had a policy, followed by all........No pass word NO information. We also used the last 4 digitis of the account number......saved time, confusion and frustration!

Quote from Nccity2002Callers are informed we are not allow to provide information over the phone and are encouraged to call whoever is the designated family spoke person (if for whatever reason patient unable to take call). If the patient is able to take the call...just ask the patient.

We use the last four digits of the patient's medical record number as a code. This is given to the patient or family at first contact. This makes it easy for staff to check the code against the patient chart. No information is given out without the code.

I work in NICU and I love our system. In that we have a system and when I worked in the adult world there was never a system and a lot of confusion.The mother of the baby is assumed to be able to get information on the infant, with the code printed on their matching bands. She fills out a form on the first visit (if possible) designating who may call for information. We encourage this to be kept to just the father or one other relative. The parents are made aware that if some other person on the authorization form calls for information they may get an update the parents are not yet aware of as we are not going to screen and classify information, it's all or nothing. This encourages the parents to keep that authorization form list very very short.Of course everything can get complicated but this covers 95% of the situations and it's real simple to ask for a band number while you check the front of the chart for the authorization form.

No medical information is given over the phone at my facility.