WebMD Defends Privacy Protection Stance 03/13/01
ELMWOOD PARK, NEW JERSEY, U.S.A., 2001 MAR 13 (NB) -- By Martin Stone, Newsbytes. Online healthcare information site WebMD Corp. [NASDAQ:HLTH] said it is creating a defense in two lawsuits recently filed against it, one by pharmaceutical site Quintiles Transnational Corp. [NASDAQ:QTRN] and another by Infocure Corp., doing business as VitalWorks [NASDAQ:VWKS].
WebMD said that in February, after a regulatory review with outside legal counsel, the company decided that various state laws prohibited it from providing certain data to Quintiles under a data sharing agreement between the companies. Accordingly, WebMD notified Quintiles that it was exercising its right to suspend data deliveries until the data could be cleansed of elements that could enable Quintiles to identify particular patients and until other legal issues were addressed.
Quintiles then filed suit against WebMD and obtained a temporary state court order requiring WebMD to continue to deliver data, which WebMD said raised patient privacy concerns.
The case was transferred to the US District Court of the Eastern District of North Carolina, which held a hearing on Mar. 5, and is scheduled to hold a further hearing on Mar. 16 to consider various motions. The state court restraining order expired Mar. 7.
Accordingly, pending the federal court's hearing on Mar. 16, WebMD has curtailed the amount and type of data that it transmits to Quintiles, and has blocked data originating from certain sources until Quintiles addresses WebMD's legal concerns, the company said.
WebMD and Quintiles are seeking to negotiate an acceptable format and procedure for future data delivery to meet the requirements of state and federal law, WebMD said.
Martin J. Wygod, WebMD's CEO, said "Maintaining patient privacy and confidentiality is of paramount importance to WebMD as well as to our customers and strategic partners. WebMD's business demands that it be the most trusted source of healthcare information and connectivity and that it achieve the highest levels of patient, physician and payer confidence."
WebMD also announced that healthcare site Infocure filed a complaint against WebMD in the Superior Court of Fulton County, Ga. The complaint asserts, among other things, that WebMD has breached its marketing agreement with Infocure by withholding certain rebates owed to Infocure and soliciting Infocure's customers. WebMD said it believes Infocure's positions are without merit and intends to vigorously defend against the complaint.
The companies are at webmd.com , quintiles.com and infocure.com .
Reported by Newsbytes.com, newsbytes.com .
(200110313/Press Contact: Jennifer Meyer, WebMD, 646-521-9212, e-mail: jmeyer@webmd.net or Pat Grebe, Quintals, 919-998-2000, e-mail: pat.grebe@quintiles.com /WIRES ONLINE, LEGAL, BUSINESS/WBMD/PHOTO) |
