UCLA staffer looked through Farrah Fawcett's medical records
Months before employees were caught snooping on Britney Spears' files, the hospital discovered that Fawcett's records had also been improperly accessed, her reps say.
Months before UCLA Medical Center caught its staffers snooping in the medical records of pop star Britney Spears, '70s TV icon Farrah Fawcett learned that a hospital employee had surreptitiously gone through records of her cancer treatments there, documents and interviews show.
Fawcett's lawyers said they are concerned that the information was subsequently leaked or sold to tabloids, including the National Enquirer.
Shortly after UCLA doctors told Fawcett that her cancer had returned -- and before she had told her son and closest friends -- the Enquirer posted the news on its website. Indeed, alarming headlines regularly cropped up in the Enquirer and its sister publication, the Globe, within days of Fawcett's treatments at the UCLA hospital.
UCLA subsequently terminated the employee who inappropriately reviewed Fawcett's records, according to one person familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity.
This was the second time that information on Fawcett's links to UCLA was inappropriately shared by someone connected with the hospital. In a 2006 letter, one of her physicians, Gary Gitnick, informed Fawcett that a former hospital contractor had listed her name on his blog, "suggesting you are a patient and/or charitable donor of mine and UCLA."
While Fawcett, now 61, was being treated at UCLA, officials had been monitoring access to some of her records to guard against a privacy breach -- and found none, said Carole A. Klove, chief compliance and privacy officer for UCLA Healthcare and Medical Sciences.
But after the Enquirer ran its exclusive story, "Farrah's Cancer is Back!," last May, Fawcett complained to her doctor, Eric Esrailian, and UCLA launched an investigation and looked at additional records. The hospital discovered "multiple reviews" of her records by a worker who was not involved in Fawcett's treatment, Klove said.
Klove said the hospital found no evidence that the worker either inappropriately disclosed or sold the information she acquired. Klove would not identify the worker involved, citing employee privacy.
"Our patients need to know that they can trust that when they come to UCLA that their information will be kept safe and secure," she said. "When and if we find inappropriate disclosures, we do take action, and that disciplinary action can include termination."
Fawcett, who is most famous for her work on the 1970s television series "Charlie's Angels" and a bestselling swimsuit poster, declined to comment.
