Laptop with info on heart patients stolen
The unencrypted medical information of about 2,500 participants in a cardiac study conducted by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) may have been compromised by the theft of a laptop PC last month.
The potentially compromised information includes the names, birth dates and hospital medical record numbers of the study participants, as well as data from reports about cardiac MRI procedures performed on them, the NHLBI said in a statement issued today. The MRI reports contain information such as heart measurements and diagnoses, according to the statement, which was attributed to NHLBI Director Elizabeth Nabel.
