CalHospitalCompare.org

Know Your Patient Rights

State and federal regulations, plus hospital industry standards, require every California hospital to observe a basic set of patients' rights. These cover:

• The information a patient must be given;
• A patient's participation in decisions about care (including the right to refuse treatment and the right to leave the hospital);
• Patient privacy and confidentiality; and
• The hospital's duty to reasonably respond to patient requests.

Some individual hospitals add extra protections of their own; for example, an internal patient advocacy system to handle patient problems and complaints.

Information on the patient's bill of rights is available by calling the California Hospital Association at 800.494.2001.

Once you decide where you will receive care, contact the hospital's administrator and ask if the hospital has its own set of patients' rights. Also ask whether the hospital has a patient advocate or ombudsman (whose job it is to help you enforce those rights; see Help in the Hospital) and how a patient can contact that person. If the hospital has no patient advocate or ombudsman, ask what the hospital's procedure is for a patient who needs help with concerns about care.