Do Hospitals Have to Report DUI Patients?

If you arrive at the hospital for treatment and a test shows that your blood alcohol is over the legal limit, does the hospital have to report you to law enforcement? This is the question posed in a recent Oregon case, and the court answered “yes”. Oklahoma does not have the type of “mandatory reporting” statute in effect in Oregon, but in some cases doctors may feel an obligation to inform law enforcement anyway. In the Oregon case, a statute required health care facilities to notify law enforcement of patients with over 0.08 alcohol concentration or a controlled substance in their...

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