Manatee County Emergency Medical Services 

DETAILED NOTICE OF PRIVACY PRACTICES 

IMPORTANT: THIS NOTICE DESCRIBES HOW MEDICAL INFORMATION ABOUT YOU MAY BE USED AND DISCLOSED, AND HOW YOU CAN OBTAIN ACCESS TO THIS INFORMATION. 

PLEASE REVIEW IT CAREFULLY. 

Manatee County Emergency Medical Service (MCEMS) is committed to protecting your personal health information. We are required by law to maintain the privacy of health information that could reasonably be used to identify you, known as “protected health information” or “PHI.” We are also required by law to provide you with this detailed Notice of Privacy Practices (“Notice”) explaining our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to your PHI. 

We respect your privacy and treat all healthcare information about our patients with care under strict policies of confidentiality that our staff is committed to always following. 

PLEASE READ THE DETAILED NOTICE. IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT IT, PLEASE CONTACT: MCEMS Headquarters at 941-749-3500 Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., or via email at emsbilling@mymanatee.org.  

Purpose of This Notice: This Notice describes your legal rights, advises you of our privacy practices, and lets you know how MCEMS is permitted to use and disclose PHI about you.   

Uses and Disclosures of Your PHI We Can Make Without Your Authorization: MCEMS may use or disclose your PHI without your authorization, or without providing you with an opportunity to object, for the following purposes:  

• Treatment: This includes such things as verbal and written information that we obtain about you and use about your medical condition and treatment provided to you by us and other medical personnel (including doctors and nurses who give orders to allow us to provide treatment to you).  It also includes information we give to other healthcare personnel to whom we transfer your care and treatment, and includes transfer of PHI via radio or telephone to the hospital or dispatch center, as well as providing the hospital with a copy of the written record we create while providing you with treatment and transport. Under Florida Law (Fla. Stat. § 401.30), EMS records are strictly confidential and are generally disclosed only to the patient, the healthcare facility receiving the patient, or by court order. 

• Payment: This includes any activities we must undertake to get reimbursed for the services that we provide to you, including such things as organizing your PHI, submitting bills to insurance companies (either directly or through a third-party billing company), managing billed claims for services rendered, performing medical necessity determinations and reviews, performing utilization reviews, and collecting outstanding accounts. 

• Healthcare Operations: This includes quality assurance activities, licensing, and training programs to ensure that our personnel meet our standards of care and follow established policies and procedures, obtaining legal and financial services, conducting business planning, processing grievances and complaints, creating reports that do not individually identify you for data collection purposes, fundraising, and certain marketing activities. If we use your PHI for fundraising, you have the right to opt out of receiving such communications.  

Special Protections for Substance Use Disorder (SUD) Records 

Effective February 16, 2026, new federal rules (42 CFR Part 2) apply to records regarding the identity, diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment of any patient maintained in connection with a substance use disorder program. 

• Use and Disclosure: If MCEMS receives SUD records from a "Part 2" program, we may only use or disclose them for treatment, payment, and healthcare operations as permitted by law [provided we have obtained your prior written consent. Once obtained, we may further disclose those records for these purposes as permitted by the HIPAA Privacy Rule.  

• Mandatory Notice Prohibiting Re-disclosure: Any disclosure of SUD records made with your written consent will be accompanied by the following statement: This record, which has been disclosed to you, is protected by federal confidentiality rules (42 CFR Part 2). The federal rules prohibit you from making any further disclosure of this record unless further disclosure is expressly permitted by the written consent of the individual whose information is being disclosed in this record or is otherwise permitted by 42 CFR Part 2. A general authorization for the release of medical or other information is NOT sufficient for this purpose (see § 2.31). The federal rules restrict any use of the information to investigate or prosecute with regard to a crime any patient with a substance use disorder, except as provided at §§ 2.12(c)(5) and 2.65. 

• Legal Proceedings: SUD records may not be used or disclosed in any civil, criminal, administrative, or legislative proceedings against you, including undercover investigations or for the purpose of initiating or substantiating criminal charges, unless you provide specific written consent or a specialized court order is issued. 

• Fundraising: We will not use SUD-related information for fundraising unless you are first provided with a clear opportunity to opt out. 

Other Uses and Disclosure of Your PHI We Can Make Without Authorization: MCEMS is also permitted to use or disclose your PHI without your written authorization in situations including: 

• For the treatment activities of another healthcare provider;  

• To another healthcare provider or entity for the payment activities of the provider or entity that receives the information (such as your hospital or insurance company); 

• To another healthcare provider (such as the hospital to which you are transported) for the healthcare operations activities of the entity that receives the information, if the entity receiving the information has or has had a relationship with you and the PHI pertains to that relationship; 

• For healthcare fraud and abuse detection or for activities related to compliance with the law; 

• To a family member, other relative, or close friend, or other individual involved in your care, if we obtain your verbal agreement to do so, or if we allow you to object to such a disclosure and you do not raise an objection.  We may also disclose health information to your family, relatives, or friends if we infer from the circumstances that you would not object.  For example, we may assume that you agree to our disclosure of your personal health information to your spouse when your spouse has called the ambulance for you.  In situations where you are incapable of objecting (because you are not present or due to your incapacity or medical emergency), we may, in our professional judgment, determine that a disclosure to your family member, relative, or friend is in your best interest.  In that situation, we will disclose only health information relevant to that person's involvement in your care.  For example, we may inform the person who accompanied you in the ambulance that you have certain symptoms, and we may give that person an update on your vital signs and treatment that is being administered by our ambulance crew; 

• To a public health authority in certain situations (such as reporting a birth, death or disease, as required by law), as part of a public health investigation, to report child or adult abuse, neglect or domestic violence, to report adverse events such as product defects, or to notify a person about exposure to a possible communicable disease, as required by law; 

• For health oversight activities, including audits or government investigations, inspections, disciplinary proceedings, and other administrative or judicial actions undertaken by the government (or its contractors) by law to oversee the healthcare system; 

• For judicial and administrative proceedings, as required by a court or administrative order, or in some cases in response to a subpoena or other legal process; 

• For law enforcement activities in limited situations, such as when there is a warrant for the request or a specific court order as required by Florida Statute § 401.30, or when the information is needed to locate a suspect or stop a crime; 

• For military, national defense, and security, and other special government functions; 

• To avert a serious and reasonably foreseeable threat to the health and safety of a person or the public at large; 

• For workers’ compensation purposes, and in compliance with workers’ compensation laws; 

• To coroners, medical examiners, and funeral directors for identifying a deceased person, determining the cause of death, or carrying on their duties as authorized by law; 

• If you are an organ donor, we may release health information to organizations that handle organ procurement or organ, eye, or tissue transplantation, or to an organ donation bank, as necessary to facilitate organ donation and transplantation; and 

• For research projects, but this will be subject to strict oversight and approvals, and health information will be released only when there is a minimal risk to your privacy and adequate safeguards are in place in accordance with the law. 

Uses and Disclosures of Your PHI That Require Your Written Consent: Any other use or disclosure of PHI, other than those listed above, will only be made with your written authorization (the authorization must specifically identify the information we seek to use or disclose, as well as when and how we seek to use or disclose it).  Specifically, we must obtain your written authorization before using or disclosing your: (a) psychotherapy notes, other than for the purpose of carrying out our own treatment, payment, or health care operations purposes, (b) PHI for marketing when we receive payment to make a marketing communication; or (c) PHI when engaging in a sale of your PHI.   

You may revoke your authorization at any time, in writing, except to the extent that we have already used or disclosed medical information in reliance on that authorization. 

Your Rights Regarding Your PHI: As a patient, you have several rights with respect to your PHI, including the right to access, copy, or inspect your PHI.  You have the right to inspect and copy most of the medical information that we collect and maintain about you.  Requests for access to your PHI should be made in writing to our HIPAA Compliance Officer.  In limited circumstances, we may deny you access to your medical information, and you may appeal certain types of denials.  We have available forms to request access to your PHI, and we will provide a written response if we deny you access and let you know your appeal rights.  If you wish to inspect and copy your medical information, you should contact MCEMS.