According to an article on NPR, titled Why Pay for Health Insurance When You Can Steal It, “when it comes to  medical identity theft, it’s the hospitals and the patients who are most at risk.” No one would disagree with that  however don’t you think the patient has the most risk?

Hospitals all over the country are experiencing higher instances of medical identity theft where individuals are using other people’s names, Social Security numbers and insurance cards to get health care. The majority of these cases are considered “inside jobs” with thieves working within the health care field as receptionists or accountants. So how can you, as a medical consumer, protect yourself?

This isn’t an instance where the most that could happen is your credit is damaged and it takes a few years to remedy—you can lose your life. Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum states “we’ve had people who, all of a sudden, their health care record has different blood types or they have health care records with different genders and ages even different medications. There are people we’ve talked with who, their imposter went in and had a hospital stay and put down that they were allergic to one drug, and then the real person is not allergic to that drug, but they’re allergic to other drugs.” This incorrect information can inconvenience you and worse can or will kill you in an emergency situation.

Imagine an instance where you are in an accident, rushed to the emergency room unconscious and loosing blood. Dixon’s suggestion of “try to get our patients to speak their information to us, so that we can confirm it” will not help in this scenario. More than likely you will be given the wrong blood type based on your inaccurate (stolen) medical record and could die because of it.

ViVre Medical champions being an aware medical consumer and obtaining your medical records. The truth of the matter is there is not a magical database that stores all your medical information and is patiently waiting for when you need it most. That type of system just doesn’t exist and unfortunately most people do not discover this until it is has negatively impacted their life. Meaning they or a family member have fallen ill and discover the fairy tale health system is simply nonexistent. Therefore it is crucial to be an alert medical consumer taking charge of your health care; this includes getting your medical records, keeping them up to date and communicating with your doctors. Part of protecting yourself includes having precautions in place if medical fraud were to happen to you. The LifeGuard30 can serve as an added layer of protection to help avoid mistakes that could result from medical fraud.