By Haywood                                             S.B. No. 973
       74R7101 DD-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to the disclosure of certain information relating to
    1-3  certain patients of a physician.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Section 576.005(c), Health and Safety Code, is
    1-6  amended to read as follows:
    1-7        (c)  A disclosure under Subsection (b) may not be made if the
    1-8  patient, or if the patient is incompetent, the patient's guardian
    1-9  of the person, gives contrary written instructions to the treating
   1-10  physician.  This subsection does not apply if the patient is a
   1-11  minor.
   1-12        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-13  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-14  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-15  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-16  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   1-17  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   1-18  passage, and it is so enacted.