Eighty-seven families received notification from Erlanger Health System, saying their child's medical records were found outside the hospital.

The William Jennings Bryan Dorn VA Medical Center has alerted 7,405 veteran patients of a recent breach involving an unprotected laptop containing their personal information.

The Office of the State Attorney, the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Secret Service allege a University of Florida employee acquired patient insurance information, including names, addresses, dates of birth and Social Security numbers, and may have sold some of the information to a third party.

More than 5,000 hospice patients and their families have been notified about a possible breach of personal information following a February break-in at the organization’s office.

Advocacy organization Patient Privacy Rights (PPR) has published its Privacy Trust Framework, a set of more than 75 auditable criteria based on 15 key privacy principles. The framework enables objective measurement of how well health IT, platforms, applications, electronic systems and research projects protect data privacy and ensure patient control over the collection, use and disclosure of their health data.

Even as the new Omnibus federal privacy and security rules went into effect with an upcoming compliance date of Sept. 23, three data breaches were reported by healthcare organizations this week.

A Utah-based medical clinic notified federal health officials of a potential data breach of approximately 2,600 medical appointment records, according to a March 22 article in the Salt Lake Tribune.

A stolen laptop is the source of a data breach of approximately 4,000 Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) patients. The unencrypted laptop containing their personal health information was stolen from an OHSU surgeon's rented vacation home in February.