Update. Since I have communicated with Mr Oppey at the Austin he has had further communication from others (notably the AMA) who were concerned about the Austin's approach of using unencrypted e-mails to GPs. He was taking these concerns back to the Privacy committee of the Austin and was reinvestigating encryption options.
Others on the list have stated that we should not discourage health professionals sending e-mails to us if not encrypted by saying we are not legally liable. Maybe so, but I feel I have a duty to protect my patients from all manner of bad practice when it comes to their health issues. If I am aware of poor standards being practised on my patients then I should do what I can, as a patient advocate, to avoid that. This extends to communication from hospitals. I have complained to hospital managements many times about poor quality and poorly timed discharge information and I will continue to do so. Likewise, I will not receive e-mails unencrypted from other health professionals in order to protect my patients' privacy. You may not be liable, but your patient may suffer a bad outcome as a result of receiving sensitive information in unencrypted e-mails. regards Rob Hosking Greg Twyford wrote: > Rob Hosking wrote: > >> Dear All >> I would be interested in other people's ideas to respond to this e-mail >> from Pail Oppy at Austin Health.( The Austin is one of the major >> hospitals in Melbourne for those who don't know). >> I have asked to be removed from their e-mail list suggesting that I will >> only receive encrypted e-mail regarding my patients. It concerns me that >> such a large public institution is going down the track of using plain >> e-mail for this communication with GPs. They also appear to have sought >> advice from the Privacy Commissioner which is at odds to the advice the >> GPCG received during the Security Project.Like most things, I suspect >> that people will interpret things the way they want until it is >> challenged legally. > > > Amazing indeed! > > Apart from the Privacy Commissioner's usual lack of regard for privacy > issues [some personal experience re my own health data suggests that > they are a total waste of space], are we all forgetting the RACGP's > third edition standards, soon to come into force? > > Their standards relating to information transmission 4.2.3 clearly > states that a practice's transmission of patient data over a public > network must be encrypted. > > Yes, you can split hairs about receiving unencrypted patient data > versus transmitting it, but that's being a bit disingenuous to say the > least. > > I wonder what the ACHS would say about Austin Hospital's behaviour? > > Greg _______________________________________________ Gpcg_talk mailing list [email protected] http://ozdocit.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gpcg_talk
