Doctor On Demand Professionals Notice of Privacy Practices

Effective Date: April 15, 2022

THIS NOTICE DESCRIBES HOW MEDICAL INFORMATION ABOUT YOU MAY BE USED AND DISCLOSED AND HOW YOU CAN GET ACCESS TO THIS INFORMATION. PLEASE REVIEW IT CAREFULLY.

Included Health, Inc. (“Included Health”) operates the websites located at includedhealth.com and doctorondemand.com, and other websites, products, services, and mobile applications with links to this Notice of Privacy Practices, including without limitation the Doctor On Demand webpages and applications (collectively, the “Sites” or “Websites”, unless otherwise specified). Users of the Sites or Services are referred below as “Users”, “Members”, “you”, “your”, or “yours”.

Included Health offers online telehealth services enabling our Members to report their health history and engage independent healthcare professionals (“Healthcare Professionals”) to obtain medical and healthcare services, as well as provide behavioral health coaching from Coaches (“Coaches”) who do not provide professional or clinical services.

The Healthcare Professionals who deliver Services through Included Health are independent professionals practicing within several groups of independently owned professional practices. The practices that are subject to this Notice include Doctor On Demand Professionals of California, P.C.; Doctor On Demand Professionals of Illinois Basu, Ltd.; Innovative Medical Practice of Massachusetts, P.C.; Doctor On Demand Professionals of Michigan, P.C.; Innovative Medical Practice of North Carolina, P.C.; Doctor On Demand Professionals of New Jersey, P.C.; Innovative Medical Practice of New York, P.C.; and Doctor On Demand Professionals of Texas, P.A. These practices are collectively known as “Doctor On Demand Professionals” (“us”, “we”, “our”).

This Notice of Privacy Practices or “Notice” describes how Doctor On Demand Professionals may use and disclose your health information and how you can access this information. The Doctor On Demand Professionals are part of an organized health care arrangement (OHCA). Your health information may be shared among the Doctor On Demand Professionals as necessary to carry out treatment, payment, and/or health care operations related to the OHCA. All participants in the OHCA arrangement are required to abide by this Notice.

How is patient privacy protected?

We understand that information about you and your health is personal. By “health information,” we mean protected health information as defined under federal law (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA, and its implementing regulations). Not only is it our legal obligation, but it is our business imperative to ensure the confidentiality of your health information. We continuously seek to safeguard your health information through administrative, physical, and technical means, and otherwise abide by applicable federal and state laws.

How do we collect and maintain your health information?

The health information that we collect or maintain may include:

Your name, age, email address, username, password, and other registration information.
Health information that you provide us, which may include information or records relating to your medical or health history, health status and laboratory testing results, diagnostic images, and other health related information.
Health information about you prepared or obtained by the Healthcare Professionals(s) who provide clinical services through the Site such as medical and therapy records, treatment and examination notes, and other health related information.
Billing information that you provide us, such as credit card information, or that we receive from a health plan, employer or other provider of healthcare benefits on your behalf.
Information from Apple HealthKit, to the extent you choose to sync your HealthKit data with us. It is used by our Healthcare Professionals and clinical support staff for purposes related to clinical care and healthcare management. We do not use or disclose HealthKit data for advertising, marketing, or other use-based data mining purposes other than improving health management.

How do we use and disclose health information?

We use and disclose your health information for the normal business activities that the law sees as falling in the categories of treatment, payment and healthcare operations. Generally, we do not need your permission for these disclosures under applicable laws. Below we provide examples of those activities, although not every use or disclosure falling within each category is listed:

Treatment – We keep a record of the health information you provide us. This record may include your test results, diagnoses, medications, your response to medications or other therapies, and information we learn about your medical condition through the Services. For example, we may disclose this information so that other doctors, nurses, and entities such as laboratories can meet your healthcare needs.
Payment – We document the services and supplies you receive when we are providing care to you so that you, your insurance company or another third party can pay us. For example, we may tell your health plan about upcoming treatment or services that require prior approval by your health plan.
Health Care Operations – Health information is used to improve the services we provide, to train staff, for business management, quality assessment and improvement, and for customer service. For example, we may use your health information to review our treatment and services and to evaluate the performance of our staff in caring for you.
When using the Sites or Services, your information will be shared with Included Health for the purposes stated in the Included Health Privacy Policy and Doctor On Demand Privacy Policy, where applicable and legally permissible.
We may share your information with your health plan, including in connection with their audit or review of the services we provide, such as our handling of customer calls or inquiries and recordings of such for quality assurance purposes. This may include information relating to genetic testing, substance abuse, mental health, communicable diseases and other health conditions, subject to the terms in this Notice.

We may also use and disclose your health information to:

Comply with federal, state or local laws that require disclosure.
Assist in public health activities such as tracking diseases or medical devices.
Inform government authorities to protect victims of abuse or neglect.
Comply with federal and state health oversight activities such as fraud investigations.
Respond to law enforcement officials or to judicial orders, subpoenas or other processes.
Inform coroners, medical examiners and funeral directors of information necessary for them to fulfill their duties—for example to identify a deceased person, determine a cause of death, or as authorized by law.
Facilitate organ and tissue donation or procurement.
Conduct research following internal review protocols to ensure the balancing of privacy and research needs.
Avert a serious threat to health or safety.
Assist in specialized government functions such as national security, intelligence and protective services.
Inform military and veteran authorities if you are an armed forces member (active or reserve).
Inform a correctional institution, if you are an inmate, of information necessary for the institution to provide you with health care or protect your health and safety, the health and safety of others, or the safety and security of the institution.
Inform workers’ compensation carriers or your employer if you are injured at work, as authorized by or to the extent necessary to comply with state workers compensation laws.
Recommend treatment alternatives.
Tell you about health-related products and services.
Communicate within our organization for treatment, payment, or healthcare operations.
Communicate with other providers, health plans, or their related entities for their treatment or payment activities, or health care operations activities relating to quality assessment and improvement, care coordination and the qualifications and training of healthcare professionals.
Provide information to other third parties with whom we do business, such as a record storage provider. However, you should know that in these situations, we require third parties to provide us with assurances that they will safeguard your information.
Participate in health information exchanges (“HIEs”). HIEs enable organizations participating in your care, such as hospitals, labs, and doctors, to electronically share your health information for treatment, payment, health care operations, and other lawful purposes. In some states, you have the right to opt-in or opt-out of the inclusion of your health information in an HIE. We may provide your health information in accordance with applicable law to the HIEs in which we participate.
We may also use or disclose your personal or health information for operational purposes. For example, we may communicate with individuals involved in your care or payment for that care, such as family or guardians and send appointment reminders.

All other uses and disclosures, not previously described, may only be done with your written authorization. We will also obtain your authorization before we use or disclose your health information for marketing purposes or before we would sell your information. You may revoke your authorization at any time; however, this will not affect prior uses and disclosures. In some cases state law may require that we apply extra protections to some of your health information.

What are the Healthcare Professional’s Responsibilities?

We are required by law to:

Maintain the privacy of your health information.
Provide this Notice of our duties and privacy practices.
Abide by the terms of the Notice currently in effect.
Tell you if there has been a breach that compromises your health information.

We reserve the right to change our privacy practices, and make the new practices effective for all the information we maintain. Revised notices will be posted on the Site.

Do you have any Federal Rights?

The law entitles you to:

Inspect and copy certain portions of your health information. We may deny your request under limited circumstances. You may request that we provide your health records to you in an electronic format.
Request amendment of your health information if you feel the health information is incorrect or incomplete. However, under certain circumstances we may deny your request.
Receive an accounting of certain disclosures of your health information made for the prior six (6) years, although this excludes certain disclosures for treatment, payment, and health care operations. (Fees may apply to this request.)
Request that we restrict how we use or disclose your health information. However, we are not required to agree with your requests, unless you request that we restrict information provided to a payor, the disclosure would be for the payor’s payment or healthcare operations, and you have paid for the health care services completely out of pocket.
Request that we communicate with you at a specific telephone number or address.
Obtain a paper copy of this notice even if you receive it electronically.

To make any of these requests, please note the following:

Member privacy is very important to us. As a result, before we process any requests we first must verify your identity and ensure we have enough information. This require you to submit a “verifiable request,” including:
- providing sufficient information that allows us to reasonably verify you are the person about whom we collected personal information or an authorized representative; and
- describing your request with sufficient detail that allows us to properly understand, evaluate, and respond to it.

Requests from Members are considered verified if submitted using through the Services. If you are an existing Member, please submit your request either by calling us and confirming your identity, or by submitting via the application (e.g., using the chat service, or via an open case). If, however, there is indication or suspicion of fraud or other malicious activity on the Member’s account, we may suspend reliance on these verification methods and defer to other methods to confirm authenticity.
You may alternatively contact us via the information provided below. However, please note that emailed requests are not considered verified, and we may request additional information from you (that we would already have in our records) in order to confirm your identity.

We will not respond to or process any unverified request. This is all done to protect your confidentiality and ensure, to the best of our ability, that we only process such requests for the right persons.

What if I have a complaint or want to contact you?

If you believe that your privacy has been violated, you may file a complaint with us or with the Secretary of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C. We will not retaliate or penalize you for filing a complaint with us or the Secretary.

To file a complaint with us, submit a request, or receive more information:

You may contact us by mail at:

Included Health, Inc., Privacy Officer
1 California Street, Ste. 2300
San Francisco, CA 94111

You may email us at privacy@includedhealth.com.
If you are registered, you may submit a message through the “chat” experience once logged-in.
Or you may call our general support toll free line at (855) 431-5533.

To file a complaint with the Secretary of Health and Human Services write to 200 Independence Ave., S.E., Washington, D.C. 20201, call 1-800-537-7697, or file an online complaint at https://ocrportal.hhs.gov/ocr/smartscreen/main.jsf.

Who will follow this Notice?

This Notice describes the health care practices of:

Any Healthcare Professional authorized to access and/or enter information into your health record;
All departments and units of Doctor On Demand and Doctor On Demand Professionals through which online health services are provided; and
All affiliates and volunteers.