Patient Rights & Responsibilities

You have the right to:

1. Considerate and respectful care, and to be made comfortable. You have the right to respect for your cultural, psychosocial, spiritual, and personal values, beliefs and preferences that support your dignity.
2. Have a family member, or other representative of your choosing, and your own physician notified promptly of your admission to the hospital.
3. Know the name of the licensed health care practitioner acting within the scope of his or her professional licensure, who has primary responsibility for coordinating your care, and the names and professional relationships of physicians and non-physicians who will see you.
4. Receive information about your health status, diagnosis, prognosis, course of treatment, prospects for recovery, and outcomes of care (including unanticipated outcomes) in terms you can understand. You have the right to access your medical records. You have the right to effective communication and to participate in the development and implementation of your plan of care. You have the right to participate in ethical questions that arise in the course of your care, including issues of conflict resolution, withholding resuscitative services, and forgoing or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment.

5. Make decisions regarding medical care, and receive as much information about any proposed treatment or procedure as you may need in order to give informed consent or to refuse a course of treatment. Except in emergencies, this information shall include a description of the procedure or treatment, the medically significant risks involved, alternate courses of treatment or non-treatment and the risks involved in each, and the name of the person who will carry out the procedure or treatment.

6. Request or refuse treatment, to the extent permitted by law. However, you do not have the right to demand inappropriate or medically unnecessary treatment or services. You have the right to leave the hospital even against the advice of members of the medical staff, to the extent permitted by law.
7. Be advised, if the hospital licensed health care practitioner acting within the scope of his or her professional licensure proposes to engage in or perform human experimentation affecting your care or treatment, you have the right to refuse to participate in such research projects.
8. Reasonable responses to any reasonable requests made for service.
9. Appropriate assessment and management of your pain, information about pain, pain relief measures, and to participate in pain management decisions. You may request or reject the use of any or all modalities to relieve pain, including opiate medication, if you suffer from severe, chronic intractable pain. The doctor may refuse to prescribe the opiate medication, but if so, must inform you that there are physicians who specialize in the treatment of pain with methods that include the use of opiates.

10. Formulate advance directives. This includes designating a decision maker if you become incapable of understanding a proposed treatment or become unable to communicate your wishes regarding care. Hospital staff and practitioners who provide care in the hospital shall comply with these directives. All patients’ rights apply to the person who has legal responsibility to make decisions regarding medical care on your behalf.

11. Have personal privacy respected. Case discussion, consultation, examination and treatment are confidential and should be conducted discreetly. You have the right to be told the reason for the presence of any individual. You have the right to have visitors leave prior to an examination and when treatment issues are being discussed. Privacy curtains will be used in semi-private rooms.
12. Confidential treatment of all communications and records pertaining to your care and stay in the hospital. You will receive a separate “Notice of Privacy Practices” that explains your privacy rights in detail and how we may use and disclose your protected health information.
13. Receive care in a safe setting, free from mental, physical, sexual or verbal abuse and neglect, exploitation or harassment. You have the right to access protective and advocacy services, including notifying government agencies of neglect or abuse.
14. Be free from restraints and seclusion of any form, used as a means of coercion, discipline, convenience or retaliation by staff.
15. Reasonable continuity of care, and to know in advance the time and location of appointments, as well as the identity of the persons providing the care.

16. Be informed by the physician, or a delegate of the physician, of continuing health care requirements and options following discharge from the hospital. You have the right to be involved in the development and implementation of your discharge plan. Upon your request, a friend or family member may be provided this information also.

17. Know which hospital rules and policies apply to your conduct while a patient.
18. Designate a support person as well as visitors of your choosing, if you have decision-making capacity, whether or not the visitor is related by blood, marriage, or registered domestic partner status unless:
    

    • No visitors are allowed.

    • The facility reasonably determines that the presence of a particular visitor would endanger the health or safety of a patient, a member of the health facility staff, or other visitor to the health facility, or would significantly disrupt the operations of the facility.

    • You have told the health facility staff that you no longer want a particular person to visit.

    • However, a health facility may establish reasonable restrictions upon visitation, including restrictions upon the hours of visitation and number of visitors. The health facility must inform you (or your support person, where appropriate) of your visitation rights, including any clinical restrictions or limitations. The health facility is not permitted to restrict, limit, or otherwise deny visitation privileges on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, or disability.

19. Have your wishes considered, if you lack decision-making capacity, for the purposes of determining who may visit. The method of that consideration will comply with federal law and be disclosed in the hospital policy on visitation. At a minimum, the hospital shall include any persons living in your household and any support person pursuant to federal law.

20. Examine and receive an explanation of the hospital’s bill regardless of the source of payment.
21. Exercise these rights without regard to, and be free of discrimination on the basis of age, sex, socioeconomic status, educational background, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, disability, medical condition, marital status, registered domestic partner status, genetic information, citizenship, primary language, immigration status (except as required by federal law) or the source of payment for care.
22. File a grievance. If you want to file a grievance with Enloe Health, you may do so by writing or calling the following department:
    
    • Patient Experience Manager
      Enloe Health
      1531 Esplanade
      Chico, CA 95926
      Telephone: 530-332-7005 – This line is accessible 24 hours a day. The grievance committee will review each grievance and will make every effort to provide a written response within 30 days. The written response will contain the name of a person to contact at the hospital, the steps taken to investigate the grievance, the results of the grievance process, and the date of completion of the grievance process. Concerns regarding quality of care or premature discharge will also be referred to the appropriate Utilization and Quality Control Peer Review Organization (PRO).

23. File a complaint with the California Department of Public Health and/or The Joint Commission, regardless of whether you use the hospital’s grievance process. The phone numbers and addresses for both agencies are listed below:

    • California Department of Public Health
      Licensing and Certification Program
      126 Mission Ranch Blvd.
      Chico, CA 95926
      TOLL FREE TELEPHONE NUMBER: 1-800-554-0350

    • The Joint Commission
      Division of Accreditation Operations
      Office of Quality Monitoring
      1 Renaissance Blvd.
      Oakbrook Terrace, IL 60181
      TOLL FREE TELEPHONE NUMBER: 1-800-994-6610
      Fax: 630-792-5636
      Report an incident online.

File a complaint with the Department of Fair Employment and Housing at www.dfeh.ca.gov, 800-884-1684 or 800-700-2320 (TTY) or 2218 Kausen Dr., #100, Elk Grove, CA 95758.

File a complaint with the Medical Board of California at www.mbc.ca.gov/consumers/complaints, 800-633-2322 or 2005 Evergreen St., #1200, Sacramento, CA 95815.

Your responsibilities include:

1. Providing complete and accurate information, including your full name, address, home telephone number, date of birth, Social Security number, insurance carrier and employer, when it is required.

2. Providing, to the best of your knowledge, complete and accurate information about your health and medical history, including present condition, past illnesses, hospital stays, medicines, vitamins, herbal products, and any other matters relating to your health, including perceived safety risks.

3. Ensure that the hospital has a copy of your Advance Directives.
4. Reporting perceived risks in your care and unexpected changes in your condition to your physician.
5. Reporting whether you clearly understand your treatment plan and what is expected of you. You are expected to ask questions when you do not understand information or instructions.

6. Following the treatment plan recommended by your physician. This may include following the instructions of nurses and other health care providers as they carry out the coordinated plan of care, implement your physician’s orders, and enforce the applicable hospital rules and regulations. If you believe you can’t follow through with your treatment plan, you are responsible for telling your physician.

7. Your actions and outcomes if you refuse treatment or do not follow your physician’s orders for care and treatment.
8. You are responsible for keeping appointments, and, when you are unable to do so, for notifying your physician or the hospital (for any reason).
9. Assuring that your health care financial obligations are fulfilled as promptly as possible.
10. Following hospital rules and regulations affecting patient care and conduct and for assisting in the control of noise and the number of visitors.
11. Being considerate of the rights of others by treating hospital staff, other patients, and visitors with courtesy and respect.
12. Being respectful concerning the property of other persons and the hospital.
13. By leaving valuables at home and only bringing necessary items for your hospital stay.

It is the policy of Enloe Health to provide a systematic approach to resolving conflicts that may arise concerning the care of a patient. Patients and/or designated representatives have the right to communicate complaints regarding the care received, to have those complaints investigated and when possible, resolved. Patient complaints in no way will affect future access to health care. Any patient and/or designated representative who presents a conflict in the care the patient is receiving shall be encouraged to address that issue with the direct patient care provider, the department manager or designee, an administrative representative, or the Patient Experience Manager.

• If the patient/designated representative wishes to file a formal complaint/grievance, he or she may contact Enloe Health’s Experience Manager at 530-332-7005. This line is accessible 24 hours a day.
• Complaints may also be filed with the California Department of Health Services’ Licensing and Certification Program, 126 Mission Ranch Blvd., Chico, CA 95926, or by calling 1-800-554 0350.
• Any concerns about patient care and safety in the hospital that the hospital has not addressed may be sent to The Joint Commission by calling 1-800-994-6610 or reporting an incident online.

Advance Directive Complaints

Complaints concerning compliance with the advance directive requirements may be filed with the California State Department of Public Health by calling 1-800-554-0350. (For information about creating an advance health care directive, visit our Advance Directive web page.)

This notice describes how medical information about you may be used and disclosed and how you can get access to this information. Please review it carefully. This “Notice of Privacy Practices” is available as an Adobe PDF that you can download and print. It was updated and is effective June 2017.

If you have any questions about this notice, please contact the privacy officer at 530-332-5444.

To obtain a paper copy of this notice, contact:
Enloe Health
Health Information Management Department, Correspondence Office
1531 Esplanade, Chico, CA 95926
530-332-5518

This notice describes how medical information about you may be used and disclosed and how you can get access to this information. Please review it carefully. This “Notice of Privacy Practices | Mental Health” is available as an Adobe PDF that you can download and print. It was updated and is effective June 2017.

If you have any questions about this notice, please contact the privacy officer at 530-332-5444.

To obtain a paper copy of this notice, contact:
Enloe Health
Health Information Management Department, Correspondence Office
1531 Esplanade, Chico, CA 95926
530-332-5518

You can sign up to receive text messages from Enloe Health related to your visits, MyChart account, prescription reminders and more. Please review our “Hello World SMS” terms and conditions, which you can download and print.

If you have any questions about this notice, please contact the privacy officer at privacyofficer@enloe.org.