Mattax Neu Prater Eye Center, Inc.

Mattax Neu Prater Eye Center, Inc., located in Missouri, experienced a third-party data security incident that may have resulted in unauthorized access to sensitive personal information of some of its patients. The incident was related to the electronic medical records platform “myCare Integrity,” provided by Eye Care Leaders (“ECL”), a practice performance company. This breach affected eye care practices across the country and was not specific to Mattax Neu Prater.

On or around December 4, 2021, an unauthorized party accessed the myCare Integrity data, deleting databases and system configuration files. Eye Care Leaders’ incident response team immediately stopped the unauthorized access and began investigating the incident. There was no evidence that this incident involved unauthorized access to any of Mattax Neu Prater’s patient records. However, due to a lack of available forensic evidence, Eye Care Leaders could not rule out the possibility that some protected health information (PHI) and personally identifiable information (PII) may have been exposed to the bad actor.

The information potentially exposed during the period of unauthorized access may have included patients’ names, addresses, dates of birth, social security numbers, diagnostic information, and health insurance information. Mattax Neu Prater has notified patients whose information may have been stored on the myCare Integrity system at the time of the incident and is providing resources to help protect potentially affected individuals. As of the time of the reports, there was no evidence of any attempted or actual misuse of the information, and Mattax Neu Prater had not received any reports of identity theft related to the incident.

Mattax Neu Prater is offering a toll-free number for patients to call with questions regarding the incident. The number is 1 (855) 482-1564, available Monday through Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time, excluding major U.S. holidays[1][6][7]. The breach was reported to the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights on June 28, 2022, and affected 92,361 individuals[2][5]. Eye Care Leaders is now facing multiple lawsuits regarding its handling of the breach[3].

Citations:

1. https://www.mattaxneuprater.com/notifies-patients-of-third-party-data-security-incident/
2. https://stacker.com/missouri/biggest-health-care-data-breaches-you-should-know-about-missouri
3. https://healthitsecurity.com/news/eye-care-leaders-emr-data-breach-tally-surpasses-2-million
4. https://www.dataguidance.com/news/usa-mattax-neu-prater-notifies-ocr-data-security
5. https://www.hipaajournal.com/june-2022-healthcare-data-breach-report/
6. https://portswigger.net/daily-swig/us-eye-clinic-suffers-data-breach-impacting-92-000-patients
7. https://www.idstrong.com/data-breaches/mattax-neu-prater-breach/
8. https://orpheus-cyber.com/blog-us-eye-clinic-suffers-data-breach-impacting-92000-patients/?lang=en
9. https://cyware.com/news/mattax-neu-prater-eye-center-suffers-data-breach-impacting-92000-patients-323b4846
10. https://izoologic.com/fraud-prevention/hackers-hit-a-missouri-based-eyecare-clinic-affecting-92k-patients/
11. https://www.hipaajournal.com/eye-care-leaders-impacts-millions-of-patients/