Medical emergency on Volendam

[SarasMommy]

We just completed the Singapore to Hong Kong cruise on the Volendam last week. We were supposed to dock in Puerto Princesa, Philippines on Tuesday April 14 at 7AM but instead docked 12 hours early so that a passenger could be taken off due to a medical emergency. Has anybody heard how she is doing? I understand that she had a stroke.

[woodworker&knitter]

We just completed the Singapore to Hong Kong cruise on the Volendam last week. We were supposed to dock in Puerto Princesa, Philippines on Tuesday April 14 at 7AM but instead docked 12 hours early so that a passenger could be taken off due to a medical emergency. Has anybody heard how she is doing? I understand that she had a stroke.

Good morning

I have a friend who is currently working on the Volendam,and she did tell me there had been a medical emergency. I will see if I can get any info

[SarasMommy]

Any updates?

[jtl513]

Any updates?

No HAL employee should divulge any information. In fact, if it happened in here it would be breaking federal law:

 

The HIPAA Privacy Rule (Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information) (3) provides the first national standards for protecting the privacy of health information. The Privacy Rule regulates how certain entities, called covered entities, use and disclose certain individually identifiable health information, called protected health information (PHI). PHI is individually identifiable health information that is transmitted or maintained in any form or medium (e.g., electronic, paper, or oral), but excludes certain educational records and employment records. Among other provisions, the Privacy Rule

 

gives patients more control over their health information;

 

sets boundaries on the use and release of health records;

 

establishes appropriate safeguards that the majority of health-care providers and others must achieve to protect the privacy of health information;

 

holds violators accountable with civil and criminal penalties that can be imposed if they violate patients' privacy rights;

 

strikes a balance when public health responsibilities support disclosure of certain forms of data;

 

enables patients to make informed choices based on how individual health information may be used;

 

enables patients to find out how their information may be used and what disclosures of their information have been made;

 

generally limits release of information to the minimum reasonably needed for the purpose of the disclosure;

 

generally gives patients the right to obtain a copy of their own health records and request corrections;

 

and empowers individuals to control certain uses and disclosures of their health information.

 

If a friend or relative wants to tell something that's different, but otherwise we should know nothing.

[jtl513]

In fact, if it happened in here it would be breaking federal law:

I meant to say "here in this country"

[rfbdorf]

My understanding is that the critical part of HIPAA is "individually identifiable health information." That would mean that if someone divulged that "a passenger was had a stroke, was taken from the ship to the hospital and is now doing well" or that "25 pax came down with norovirus," that would be acceptable, but if someone were to say that "Nora Nussbaum had a bad headache," that would be in violation.

OTOH, details of this case are really none of our business. Best wishes to the anonymous person who had the problem.

- Richard

[CruiserBruce]

I know this is all well intentioned, and a sincere thought, but jtl513 hit it directly on the head. Release of such info is a violation of federal law. (Of course, I wonder if such federal law applies to HAL. But any US trained and licensed medical personnel, and Seattle office personnel, should be very aware of HIPAA.) As has been witnessed lately, people who have no logical need to view medical records, have been fired for looking at medical records of people who have had info released.

 

As to "individually identifiable health information", as there was only one (it appears) person who had a serious medical emergency aboard the Volendam, saying anything (the person is doing well, or the person had an extended stay in the hospital, or the person is recovering slowly) is tricky as it would obviously pertain to that person alone. Lawyers would jump on that, saying it was obvious who was being talked about.

 

Again, I know the OP was just being caring, thoughtful and well intentioned. And we all hope the person is doing fine.

[sail7seas]

If it were you who became ill on a ship and had to be evacuated, would you like for everyone to be talking about you and seeking private information about your illness? I wouldn't.

 

I am sure everyone means well and wishes the person only the best.

 

[Himself]

I am one who in my line of work has to visit the sick in the Hospital. I give pastoral care to the sick and am very garded about any health issues I may know about. A tight lip is most apropos.

[WhansaMi]

If it were you who became ill on a ship and had to be evacuated, would you like for everyone to be talking about you and seeking private information about your illness? I wouldn't.

 

I am sure everyone means well and wishes the person only the best.

 

 

 

Actually, I think I'd be touched if people on the ship asked about me. I wouldn't mind it a bit if they asked about me, and I wouldn't mind if the crew shared information.

 

Different strokes, I guess.

[Pam in CA]

I can understand not providing specific medical histories, but on my Prinsendam cruise in 2007, there was a woman who got an appendicitis attack when we were hours north of Longyearben, Spitzbergen. We turned around to drop her off for an emergency appendectomy. Not only was her condition announced to everyone on the ship but a letter from her husband updating everyone on her condition was read by the Captain. IMHO, there's a big difference between personal information disclosure and people expressing their caring. It wouldn't have occurred to me to sue her because we missed cruising into the polar ice cap (which we did after the Captain adjusted the itinerary) but I bet it crossed someone's mind because there was all sorts of grousing, whining and complaining. I even overhead one person saying that passengers should take a medical exam before being allowed to board (yearsureright, that's practical.)

[Copper10-8]

I can understand not providing specific medical histories, but on my Prinsendam cruise in 2007, there was a woman who got an appendicitis attack when we were hours north of Longyearben, Spitzbergen. We turned around to drop her off for an emergency appendectomy. Not only was her condition announced to everyone on the ship but a letter from her husband updating everyone on her condition was read by the Captain. IMHO, there's a big difference between personal information disclosure and people expressing their caring. It wouldn't have occurred to me to sue her because we missed cruising into the polar ice cap (which we did after the Captain adjusted the itinerary) but I bet it crossed someone's mind because there was all sorts of grousing, whining and complaining. I even overhead one person saying that passengers should take a medical exam before being allowed to board (yearsureright, that's practical.)

 

You make a number of good points, Pam! I think a lot has to do with the type of medical emergency that occurs on board and might be witnessed by other passengers. If someone has an unexpected heart attack and winds up dying from it, that's nobody's business but the family's and, if its unexpected, that's going to be very hard to take by them and I seriously doubt they want it shared with the world.

A couple of years ago, we witnessed a medevac on/off a HAL ship by a Coast Guard helo off the Florida Keys. The next day, the captain announced on his 'voice from the bridge' the good news that the patient was in stable condition in a Miami area hospital. Would he have made a statement if the patient would have passed away enroute to, or at that same hospital? I strongly doubt it!

Another couple of years ago, someone on CC while on a cruise, witnessed another passenger collapse/suffer an apparent heart attack while ashore on an island, receive medical aid and being medevac'ed to a hospital. The poster wanted to know the condition of the guest. There is a line here that you don't want to cross, especially when the outcome is not positive. Besides the quoted law, there's also the 'need to know' factor. When coming across a serious traffic accident, do we, as uninvolved citizens, have the need to know the physical condition of the involved driver(s), passenger(s) and/or pedestrian(s)?

[sail7seas]

No, John. We have no need to know. Thank you for putting it so well.

 

[SarasMommy]

Good grief, I had no idea that this would turn into a detailed analysis of privacy laws. I certainly wasn't looking for a copy of her medical chart. I was simply concerned for a fellow human being, that's all. The situation hit close to home for me because two years ago my mother almost had to be taken off the ship in Shanghai due to heart problems, so it could have easily been me and my family needing to be medevac'd.

[catl331]

Not only was her condition announced to everyone on the ship but a letter from her husband updating everyone on her condition was read by the Captain.

Obviously the Captain had the permission and wishes of the husband to divulge the information. That makes it an entirely different situation.