The following is designed for Regulated Health Professionals.
These scenarios will help you make practical decisions when you're in a situation where someone's privacy or confidentiality might be compromised.
Read them and choose the answer that makes sense to you. A pop-up will explain why your answer is correct or incorrect.
On route to Radiology, a patient being transported in a wheelchair is asked to hold their health record while the porter pushes the wheelchair. The patient proceeds to open and read the record.
What do you think? Is the patient allowed to read their record?
Yes - Patients have the right to review their health records
No - Patients do not have the right to review their health records
You are organizing a curling team to compete with other teams in your community. You want a 'ringer.' You recall a former patient who mentioned she was quite good at the sport and but had not played since she moved to your community - she was eager to start again. You access her telephone number from her electronic health record. You make certain to ignore all other information.
What do you think? Choose the description that best describes your actions:
No breach of privacy: Telephone numbers are public information. You simply accessed it in a different way.
Breach of privacy: You breached the patient's privacy because the phone number was collected out of context of providing her care.
A nurse prepares to fax a transcribed report to a different health care facility. The report is for a patient being referred to a specialist for consultation. The patient's physician has discussed the consultation with the patient.
What do you think?
The nurse may send the fax
The nurse still needs to get written consent
