In the fall of 2007 through the spring of 2008 there was a epidemic of hospital employees snooping through celebrities’ medical records. Part of George Clooney’s records were leaked in the fall after his motorcycle accident, then 13 UCLA employees were fired for looking through Britney Spears’ records, and it was eventually revealed that one of them sold her information for $4,600. UCLA staff also snooped through Farrah Fawcett’s information, some of which was sold to the Enquirer.

Given all that, it comes as no surprise that 15 employees at Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center poked around through Nadya Suleman’s hospital records without reason.

Fifteen hospital workers have been fired and another eight disciplined for looking at medical records of octuplet mother Nadya Suleman without permission, hospital officials said.

Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center reported the violations of health care privacy laws to the state and has warned employees to keep away from Suleman’s records unless they have a medical purpose, hospital spokesman Jim Anderson said Monday.

“Despite the notoriety of this case, to us this person is a patient who deserves the privacy that all our patients get,” Anderson said. Anderson would not elaborate on how the other eight employees were reprimanded, saying only that the punishments were significant.

Anderson said Kaiser does not believe any of Suleman’s information was shared with the media, based on the results of their inquiry. Her attorney Jeff Czech said Suleman does not plan to file a lawsuit over the breach, though he suspects Kaiser employees were looking for medical information on Suleman’s sperm donor. He said the name is not listed on the medical records. “She trusts Kaiser and they said they’d look into it,” Czech said. “We feel that they’re on top of it and are taking care of it.”

Anderson could not provide details about when Suleman’s medical records were accessed and what kind of hospital employees looked at them. He said Kaiser had warned its employees about patient confidentiality rules before Suleman checked into the hospital in December.

Even if the employees peeked at the records just to satisfy their curiosity, without any intention of disclosing details, they were disciplined according to Kaiser’s policies, Anderson said.

[From the New York Daily News]

I could never work in one of those positions. I would find it way too hard to resist looking at people’s files. Not to sell stuff, but I can’t be trusted not to snoop. Idle curiosity I suppose.

I’m very surprised that Nadya isn’t planning on suing over this. A large bulk of her income over the last several years has come from working the system. She’s generally considered to be quite the opportunist, and this issue seems like a potential goldmine. I mean she didn’t have anything to do with the wrongdoings – what more could she ask for?

I’m guessing the decision not to file a lawsuit has as much to do with public goodwill as anything. Nadya’s really on a lot of people’s sh*t lists. She can’t take much more publicity without expecting a mob of torch-wielding villagers banging down her door.

Here’s Octomom on March 21st. Images thanks to INF News and Features.