<human>: Hello, my wife was in the hospital for 2.5 days and then released. We are uninsured. 

Upon her release we were told that we could apply for financial aid. The application included our names, address, ssn, employer and wage information, monthly expenses etc.. We were also required to provide copy of our tax records for the last two years, several months of bank statements, pay stubs and photo IDs. We completed the application, gathered up all required documents and put them in a sealed yellow envelope with my wife's name on it and something to the effect of "Financial Aid Application". We turned it into the "Patient Accounts" office at the hospital. The lady that I gave it to assured me that it was the proper place to turn it into and that we would here something in 2-3 weeks.  The application was turned in within the required 7 day window. 

Long story short, the hospital claims to have lost the packet. It was never received by the appropriate department and they have no idea what happened. They claim to have gone back to the security footage to try and track it down but the footage had been erased based on their normal protocol. They gave us another application to fill out and turn in, which we did, but this time it was only 3 pages and they didn't require all of the previous documents. 

We are very concerned. 1. We have no idea who ended up with every bit of our financial and personal information. 2. Its causing problems with setting up payments with the hospital because of this big delay. 

Also, before we found out that they lost the application they talked to me on the phone once about the bills and tried to set me up with an unrealistic payment plan. We agreed to wait and see what kind of financial aid we qualified for. The second time I called I was told that I was not authorized to talk about any of it. I explained that I had already been in contact with them. Their notes confirmed this but basically said that shouldn't have happened. When my wife went in to the office to give me authorization she learned that they had lost the application. 

**Should we contact a lawyer? What kind? Is this a possible Hipaa violation?

Can you succinctly summarize the text in 1-3 sentences?
<bot>: Hospital lost our financial aid application that included our tax records, social security numbers, pay stubs, bank statements.