State of Tennessee Sponsored Group Health Plan

An equipment operator at the state's postal facility set the machine to insert four (4) pages per envelope instead of one (1) page per envelope, which caused the PHI of four individuals to be sent to one address per envelope. The error affected approximately 1770 enrollees. The letters contained information such as names, addresses, birth dates, and social security numbers. As a result, the CE retrained the employee, submitted a breach report to HHS, provided notice to the affected individuals, notified the media, created a toll-free number for information regarding the incident, posted notice on its website, modified policies to remove the SSN on templates for future mailings, and offered identity theft protection to the affected individuals. Following the OCR investigation, the CE provided reviewed its policies and procedures to ensure adequate safeguards are in place. \