Pa. hospital reports loss of CD containing patient data

Wayne Memorial Hospital, Honesdale, Pa., reports that a CD carrying patient information was lost in the mail after being sent to the hospital's Medicare administrative contractor, prompting the hospital to notify patients and provide many of them a year of credit monitoring.

A package sent by certified mail was received by the MAC “damaged and without the CD,” according to a statement posted on the hospital's website. A search by the U.S. Postal Service and the contractor failed to locate the missing CD, which carried patients' names, account balances, and in some cases, Medicare numbers, according to the hospital's statement.

Lisa Champeau, a spokeswoman for Wayne Memorial Health System, the hospital's parent, said 1,182 patient records were on the unencrypted CD, part of the hospital's annual Medicare cost report of patients who owed the hospital money. A majority of the patient records, about 70%, included their Medicare ID numbers, she said. Those are the patients to whom the hospital is providing credit-monitoring services, Champeau said.