How to waive your HIPAA rights with your insurance company so your spouse can deal with the insurance company

Federal law, known as the "Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)" limits who can share your medical information with whom. While it has its benefits, if you get sick and your insurance company refuses to pay claims that it should (which happens from time to time), HIPAA will prevent the insurance company from discussing the issues at any length with your spouse. When you're sick, you don't want to deal with annoying insurance companies. Here's how to waive your HIPAA rights for cases like these.

	Call your health insurance agent or insurance company and ask for a HIPAA release form or a HIPAA waiver. Your agent or company may have such a form available on the website.
	Fill out the form. If you wish the authorization to expire on a certain date, state so on the form. You can always revoke the authorization at a later date in writing.
	Sign the form and send it in. It make take a number of weeks for the authorization to be completely processed.

• If you are expecting a medical event, such as scheduled surgery or childbirth, you may want to complete the forms before the actual event. Make sure the authorization lasts long enough for your spouse to actually deal with all remaining issues. It can take months to resolve billing issues with health insurance companies.