Community Corner

Unity Hospital Fires 28 for Patient-data Peeks after Mass-ODs

Allina also fired four others at Mercy Hospital.

Twenty-eight employees lost their jobs at in Fridley Thursday for looking at patient data related to a recent .

Allina Hospitals and Clinics also fired four workers at Mercy Hospital in Coon Rapids for violating a policy that bars employees from accessing electronic patient records without a legitimate patient-care reason.

According to spokesman David Kanihan, all 32 employees had accessed records from the March 17 mass-overdose at a Blaine house party that left one man dead and another charged with murder.

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The employees accessed the patient data shortly after the overdose incident, Kanihan said. Allina "has no reason to believe" that the employees did so for any reason other than to satisfy their own interest, he said.

Kanihan would not characterize the job categories of employees fired but said that only workers with patient-care duties have access to patient data.

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Allina is confident that the 32 fired employees represent the full scope of the policy violations, Kanihan said: "That's one of the benefits of electronic medical records systems."

Trevor Vance Robinson-Davis, 19, died at Unity Hospital March 17, about 14 hours after concerned partygoers brought him there. Timothy Richard Lamere, 21, faces a third-degree murder charge in his death for providing the 2C-E drug that prosecutors say killed him.*

Kanihan wouldn't comment on whether most of the firings happening at Unity was related to the fact that Robinson-Davis' death occurred there.

*Correction: An earlier version of this article erroneously stated that the drug was 2C-I, the name authorities originally gave it, but after state crime-lab testing they changed that later to 2C-E.


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