There’s a case in Australia that raises a slew of privacy, confidentiality, and health records security issues because dozens of women allege that a doctor who performed their abortions gave them Hepatitis C. Had this occurred during another kind of surgery, women would probably feel more comfortable coming forward to identify themselves as having been…
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Ca: New legislation to beef up privacy protocols for medical information
Adam Bowie reports: Officials with the Horizon Health Network say new health legislation will provide better guidance for medical professionals about how they should record, access and use a patient’s personal medical information. The Personal Health Information Privacy and Access Act was proclaimed in New Brunswick on Sept. 1 – a piece of legislation that…
U.S. Says Genes Should Not Be Eligible for Patents
Andrew Pollack reports: Reversing a longstanding policy, the federal government said on Friday that human and other genes should not be eligible for patents because they are part of nature. The new position could have a huge impact on medicine and on the biotechnology industry. The new position was declared in a friend-of-the-court brief filed…
Sperm donors' privacy rights should trump rights of offspring, Vancouver court told
Neal Hall reports: The privacy rights of anonymous sperm donors should outweigh the constitutional rights of donor offspring, a government lawyer argued today. Leah Greathead, the lawyer representing B.C.’S attorney general, told a B.C. Supreme Court judge that Olivia Pratten has a very sympathetic claim — she wants to know details of her genetic history…
Wisconsin hospital adds hand scans to ID patients
Shamane Mills of WPR reports: Hospitals in New York and San Diego are using hand scans to identify patients. Now a Wisconsin hospital is too. Patients with the same name even the same birthday are rare but it’s one of things that a new system at UW Hospital and Clinics in Madison is designed to…
Ca: Personal data at risk, study found
Dana Flavelle reports that private investigators hired by an association of secure document disposal companies found lots of personal information in dumpsters in the Greater Toronto area. Doctors offices and car dealers got an unwanted shout-out in their findings. Most organizations, especially large banks and hospitals, are doing a good job of disposing of sensitive…