Health Insurance Forum - Privacy and security of medical health records

I copy/pasted this from the addiction forum; it is long winded, but I really want an answer and would be incredibly grateful to anyone who could give me one!

Dear friends,

I may post this in another forum as I am desperate for an answer. I hope that is okay. I really appreciate any help I can get (or any intentions to help Smile

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I am young, eighteen years old. Shortly before starting university this past August, I was at a house party and saw some people preparing lines of cocaine. I am what you may call a very adventurous person; I have a strong need to experience anything just once; I feel good being able to tell myself I have done something most people have not and would not (it is vanity, I know). In fact, while most young people promise themselves they will never touch drugs, I once made a vow to myself that if the opportunity to use cocaine ever arose that I would make necessary provisions for the day/night so that I could experiment with it. Therefore, I asked the person for a some and she obliged, showing me how to insufflate it.

It obviously felt good; I have not felt inclined to do it again nor have I even been in contact with somebody who could facilitate the procurement of the drug for me since that night.

But anyway, as the effect of the drug was wearing off, I suddenly remembered that I had a medical check up the following morning, for immunization forms for school. As those who are knowledgeable about cocaine know, the "crash" involves a lot of anxiety and paranoia. So I became incredibly anxious, convinced that I would take a urine test, that the results would indicate I had used cocaine, and that my parents would find out and my whole life would blow apart.

It is inexplicable because logically I know that even if the doctor was going to ask for a urine sample they would not test for these things for school immunization forms! Yet I was paranoid nevertheless

I went home and began drinking juice and water in copious amounts, I went to the physician's office the following morning. You should have seen me in the waiting room; I kept filling cup after cup of water from the tank and drinking it while waiting to be called. I went into the office and my blood pressure was high enough that the nurse remarked about it, but at any rate the doctor came in and I was incredibly nervous. I was still crashing and felt convinced I had ruined my life. There was no urine sample, but I was a bless fool and at the end, when my doctor was asking me about drug use, I froze for a little bit, he looked at me expectantly, and I explained what happened the previous night (I really felt as though I were being interrogated by government intelligence)

Anyway, at the time I didn't know anything about insurance or medical records. I had just become independent of my parents in this regard and left my pediatrician. Obviously, I didn't want this to go on my records but my anxiety caused me to crack and tell the doctor what happened. At the time I was worried my parents would realize what I had done and the doctor reassured me that it was unimaginable that they would, so I calmed down.

Lately however, I have been trying to learn more about medical records and I see that they are not as confidential as I had figured they would be. I know that, for example, this incident precludes me from working in law enforcement or things like that (not that I care about that, it just makes me wonder); I also expect my insurance rates will be high throughout life because of this, but I am wondering how else this will effect me. Suppose I wanted to work with charitable organizations abroad like...say...the peace corps. Would this preclude me? How will it affect my future?

I don't know why I felt compelled to write all of that, I could have just asked what one incident of cocaine-use at age 18 would do to my future...at any rate I am, for some reason, experiencing a great degree of anxiety about this such that it is interfering with my life, and would be extremely grateful for any enlightenment.