Insurance firms face state rules to report diseases

Art Nadler

Monday, Feb. 15, 1999 | 11:20 a.m.

Insurance companies soon will have to report to Nevada authorities the names of people with communicable diseases.

The state Health Division on Friday voted to require life insurers to inform the state health office if potential policy holders test positive for AIDS; hepatitis A, B and C; the HIV virus; syphilis and tuberculosis.

Life insurance companies do blood tests on all prospective policy holders. Nevada law requires that tests that turn up communicable diseases be released to the state, but the tests are done in laboratories in Kansas, which does not release names of those who test positive for such diseases. Currently, Kansas officials inform Nevada officials only that communicable disease cases exist.

Now life insurance companies will carry the responsibility of giving Nevada health officials names of people who test positive for the seven communicable diseases listed in the new policy.

The new regulation will take effect in 30 days.

Originally Dr. Randall Todd, state epidemiologist chief, wanted insurance companies to report 66 communicable diseases. At the request of board member Dr. Frank Nemec, the list was narrowed.

"This was a valid compromise," Todd said. "The list hits the diseases the insurance companies mostly test for."

Joann Waiters, counsel for the American Council of Life Insurance, argued that a person's personal physician should be the one reporting the results and that hepatitis is too broad of a disease and may not be communicable.

In other business, the board gave certified laboratory assistants who complete approved courses of training the authority to conduct bedside testing of patients using portable laboratory machinery.

John Canham-Clyne of the Nevada Service Employees International Union had voiced concerns that these assistants might not have the proper training and needed supervision.

But several physicians said that a person doing the testing would not be required to interpret the results and would only pass on computed information to the attending doctor.

Other medical professionals approved for this "point of care" bedside testing included registered nurses, advanced practitioners of nursing, licensed practical nurses, respiratory therapists, physician assistants and pharmacists.