Effective April 14, 2003

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a federal program that requires that all medical records and other individually identifiable health information used or disclosed by Conceptions Center for Ovum Donation in any form, whether electronically, on paper, or orally be kept confidential to maintain the privacy of your protected health information. This Act gives patients rights to understand and control how your health information is used.

We may use and disclose your medical records only for each of the following purposes: treatment, payment, or health care operations.

Treatment means providing, coordinating, or managing health care and related services by one or more health care providers. Examples of this would include related care and treatment services by health care providers, scheduling surgery, other exams or appointments with other providers, calling in prescriptions and refills, consultation between health care providers relating to a patient for coordination of care and physician to staff discussions for coordination of care, and the referral of a patient for health care from one health care provider to another.

Payment means such activities as obtaining reimbursement for services, confirming coverage, billing or collection activities, related data processing, and utilization review. An example of this would be sending a bill for your visit to your insurance company for payment.

Health care operations include the business aspects of running our practice on a daily basis, such as conducting quality assessment and improvement activities, auditing functions, cost-management analysis, and customer service. An example would be an internal quality assessment review.

Any other uses and disclosures will be made only with your written authorization. You may revoke such authorization in writing and we are required to honor and abide by that written request, except to the extent that we have already taken actions relying on your authorization.

We reserve the right to update these practices at any time. You will have the opportunity to request a paper or electronic copy of the revised notice.

We may contact you to confirm your appointments or communicate with you in connection with care management or coordination.

You have the following rights with respect to your protected health information, which you can exercise by presenting a written request to the Privacy Officer.

• The right to request restrictions on certain uses and disclosures of protected health information, including those related to disclosures to family members, other relatives, close personal friends, or any other person identified by you. We are, however, not required to agree to a requested restriction. If we do agree to a restriction, we must abide by it unless you agree in writing to revoke it.

• The right to reasonable requests to receive confidential communications of protected health information from us by alternative means or at alternative locations.

• The right to inspect and copy your protected health information.

• The right to amend your protected health information.

• The right to receive an accounting of disclosures of protected health information.

• The right to obtain a paper copy of this notice from us upon request.

We are required by law to maintain the privacy of your protected health information and to provide you with notice of our legal duties and privacy practices with respect to protected health information.

When you communicate with us via our website, we may ask for personal information about you only if you provide it to us voluntarily. “Online personal information” may or may not be individually identifiable health information that is also protected by the Privacy Rule.

Portions of our website may ask you to provide us with online personal information in order to deliver requested materials or responses to questions or concerns.

Conceptions Center for Ovum Donation does not sell, license or disclose online personal information that you provide to us.

This website may contain links to third-party Web sites. These links are provided solely as a convenience to you and not as an endorsement or recommendation by Conceptions Center for Ovum Donation of the content on such third-party Web sites, or as an indication of any affiliation, sponsorship, or endorsement of or by such third-party Web sites.

Third-party sites may have their own privacy policies or no policy at all. This Privacy Statement does not apply to such other sites. Conceptions Center for ovum Donation has no control over the content displayed on such sites, nor over the measures, if any, that are taken by such sites to protect the privacy of user information.

Conceptions Center for Ovum Donation is not responsible for the content of linked third-party sites, and does not make any representations regarding the privacy practices of, or the content or accuracy of materials on, such third-party Web sites. Your use of third-party Web sites is subject to the terms of use for such sites. If you decide to access third-party Web sites that are linked to this Site, you do so at your own risk.

This notice is effective as of April 14, 2003 and we are required to abide by the terms of the Notice of Privacy Practices and to make the new notice provisions effective for all protected health information that we maintain.

If you feel that your privacy protections have been violated, you have the right to file a formal, written complaint with our office or with the Department of Health & Human Services, Office of Civil Rights, about violations of the provisions of this notice or the policies and procedures of our office. We will not retaliate against you for filing a complaint.