HIV-positive patients sue hospital over records lost on train

The plaintiffs want to know if the billing manager still works at the hospital and whether she still has access to their records, Yasi said, as well as what policies have been put in place to prevent this from happening again. According to court documents, Mass. General rules forbid taking private patient information out of the hospital.

Mass. General declined to be interviewed, but said in a statement that doctors had called patients to apologize.

"We have learned valuable lessons from this difficult situation," the statement said. "We are strengthening our efforts to protect patient health information through such means as enhanced training programs and by identifying and limiting situations that could put health information at risk."

Several patients have contacted the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders with concerns about the lost records, GLAD lawyer Ben Klein said. In his 15 years at GLAD, he said, calls concerning HIV privacy breaches are among the most frequent the Boston group gets. This case is unusual because of the number of people affected, he said.

"Although much has changed about HIV over the years, one of the things that hasn't changed is that for so many people the public disclosure of HIV status is still profoundly distressing and harmful," he said. "Even though we don't know what has happened to the records, the sense of powerlessness that people have about not knowing what has happened to this very sensitive health information is profoundly distressing."

GLAD and three other groups -- the AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts, Justice Resource Institute Health, and the Health Law Clinic of the Legal Services Center at Harvard Law School -- are trying to arrange a meeting with Mass. General to discuss ways to protect patient privacy.

"Litigation doesn't always accomplish the goals people want it to," Klein said. "Our goal is to ensure that there are strong policies in place to prevent this from happening again and to ensure that Mass. General is responsive to the needs of the patients."