8,000 Patients at Risk of Identity Theft

A temp worker of Texas Health Resources, based in Arlington, Texas steals the identity of 8,000 patients. The temp had been working in the THR Dallas business office since May 2007. Over the past 5 months, this worker was pilfering patient identities. On September 5, THR's compliance hotline was notified of a patient's unauthorized use of their credit card. As a result of further investigation, Garland police arrested the alleged identity thief, identified as Kristina Renee Garcia, 31, of Garland. Garcia has been charged with two counts of credit card abuse, one count of forgery and one count of fraudulent use/possession of identifying information, according to police.

THR should be commended for their quick action in this case. Within 24 hours, police were notified of the breach and Garcia was escorted from the THR facility and placed under arrest. In addition, all patients which may have been effected were sent notices.

Elaine Anderson, senior vice president and chief compliance officer for THR, stated, "At this time, we do believe that this is an isolated incident," she added. "We are reviewing everything. If we find opportunities to strengthen our processes we will obviously do so. We believe we have strong processes in place. We take the safeguarding of our patient information as one of our highest priorities."

Texas Health Resources is a non-profit health care company. Its system includes 13 affiliated hospitals including Harris Methodist Hospitals, Arlington Memorial Hospital and Presbyterian Healthcare System.