T
he following excerpt is from the Houston Chronicle about Xerox and the State coming to an agreement on the disputed files.
AUSTIN – Lawyers for the Xerox Corp. agreed Thursday to temporarily turn over private health information about millions of Texas Medicaid recipients, setting up at least a small compromise in a high-stakes legal fight over who is responsible for years of waste in the program.
Under a deal struck in a Travis County court hearing, Xerox said it would give the records about some 2 million recipients not to the state but to state District Judge Stephen Yelenosky for safekeeping.
The agreement does not resolve the question of whether Texas or Xerox is entitled to the documents, which the company used when it was contracted by the state for nearly a decade to approve Medicaid claims for dental procedures. Yelenosky compared it to when two farmers disagree about who owns a cow and the “constable holds on to the cow while a court figures out who owns it.”
The compromise should relieve Texas of concerns about potential federal fines for violating federal health-privacy laws.
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The federal government is expected to demand a reimbursement from the state, so the state, in turn, is trying to recoup the money from Xerox. The company, meanwhile, has directed the blame to the dentists. The dentists have filed their own lawsuit against Xerox in addition to pondering one against the state.
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via Xerox agrees to temporarily turn over Medicaid records – Houston Chronicle.