Safeguarding Patient Privacy and Confidentiality in Health Facilities - Free Essay Sample

Introduction

Medical personnel working in healthcare facilities have to observe specific measures while attending to the patients. The first measure is privacy, and the second one is confidentiality. Privacy in healthcare means whatever you disclose to your healthcare provider concerning your health should remain private. For example, any information or medication your doctor has given to you should not be informed to a third party. A patient has the right to privacy and should be consulted on how to make decisions and share personal information. For instance, when you change doctors and want the new doctor to access your medical history. Private information can also be referred to as health information. Health information is any information provided by the patient and is related to a health service.

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Confidentiality is the act of safeguarding the information gathered until the circumstances surrounding the situation are calm. In health care, medical personnel who have accessed the patients' records should remain confidential with the data. Confidentiality prevents doctors from exposing the patient's information to third parties. The law recognizes confidentiality as a communication between two parties who are in a professional relationship. A good example is a patient and a physician. Therefore, it is a duty of any person entrusted with health information to keep it private. This paper discusses the various ways of safeguarding patients’ private and confidential information in hospitals.

Reasons why it is Unethical to Expose Patient Private and Confidential Information

Unethical practices in healthcare facilities involve breaking or breaching patients' confidentiality and the right to privacy. Many nurses pass through difficult challenges to provide quality ethical care. A patient shares his or her personal health problem with a doctor, understanding that it will not be disclosed to anyone. Private information includes; the computerized, visually, written, and recorded data. Confidential information is protected by a professional code of laws (Riaz, Khan, & Jafar, 2017). The modern and ancient nursing codes stresses on respecting confidential information. For example, the European convention and common law show a medical professional must honor the principle of confidentiality beyond death. Therefore, it is unlawful to expose the patient's private and confidential information. Exposing patient information can cause the patient to suffer mentally and feel demoralized. It may affect the whole healing process due to the many stories that will be circulating.

Importance of Protecting Patient’s Private and Confidential Health Information

According to research, ethical health provides many valuable benefits to society. The main aim of protecting someone's privacy is to protect the interest of the individual. Privacy prevents cases of any tangible embarrassment. It also ensures the development of interpersonal relationships between others. Patient privacy ensures complete honesty because the patient will provide more details concerning their illness, which will help the doctor figure out the disease and cure (Ulrich, Taylor, Soeken, O’Donnell, Farrar, Danis & Grady,2010). Privacy encourages many patients to visit hospitals because there is no fear of stigmatization.

In the 80s, when HIV/AIDS hit the world, many patients feared to consult their doctors because they were afraid if their diagnosis will be protected. Therefore, privacy motivates the public to seek medical care. Since the formation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) medical records and health information provided by the patient is much protected (CDC,2012). The insurance is a privileged to the patient because it states that no information should be shared without the patient consent. It protects the patient personal privacy. The rule applies to health care facilities, clearinghouse, and health plans.

Ethical Issue of Safeguarding Patient Privacy and Confidential Information

Quality ethical standards are required in a healthcare facility. These standards safeguard ethical standards under the umbrella of medical ethics, which is a field concerned with making a morally upright decision for medical practices. Professionals recommend four fundamental values to decide ethical issues. These values are autonomy, justice, beneficence, and nonmalfeasance (The Medical Portal,2020). Autonomy means that patients have a right to make their own healthcare decisions. Justice means distributing healthcare benefits across the society fairly. Beneficence is treating and taking care of the patient. Nonmalfeasance protects the patient from any harm. However, there are other values to consider, such as transparency, honesty, and respect for both the patient and family members.

Safeguarding patient privacy is an ethical issue. There are so many things you need to address as a physicians’ the following are medical ethics physicians are required to observe to avoid unethical practices while safeguarding patient's private and confidential information. The first one is maintaining a clear conscience. Many physicians are after money, but being an ethical physician is different because the most important thing is treating your patient nicely(The medical Portal, 2020). Disrespecting your patient is an ethical misstep that can ruin the relationship between patients and doctor.

Most hospitals have changed their data storage from paperwork to electronic form. Doctors store the test results, images, and medication data electronically. It enables them to view and access the medical history of the patient easily on their computer. Doctors have the responsibility of safeguarding the patient private and confidential information. Electronic health record (EHR) is an electric machine used to store a patient's medical history, which is sometimes maintained by the healthcare provider. As the technology is growing more facilities are transition to electronic systems, some health facilities are raising concerns about the external security of the information stored and the internal viewing of the data (Kruse, Smith, Vanderlinden, & Nealand,2017). Any information leaked will lessen the trust between the patient and the physician. For many years’ doctors have broken the trust of their patients, once a trust is broken, it is not easy to repair. Therefore, patients look for other doctors who can build their trust. The council that chairs Ethical and Judicial affairs state that the disclosure of confidential health information from a database should be released for a specific purpose, which is requested. Data collected should be ethically protected to avoid breach contract.

Ways of Safeguarding Patients Health Information

Performing an annual security assessment can prevent electronic information from being accessed by third parties. The facility can contact an IT security company to complete the assessment (Martin,2018). The team can access the facility data system and install some software that will prevent third parties from assessing the information. Health information can be kept secure and private using encrypted storage devices, ensuring authorized personnel access the information and disposing any outdated devices.

Developing a policy of protecting patient's information privacy. For instance, the government can establish some regulations that may control the sharing of patient data. The system ensures you inform your patient of the following information. The information you collect from them, whom you share the information with, under which circumstances have you shared it. Health facilities should document every patient detail and any authorized person who can access their data (Martin,2018). This will make work easier for security officials to investigate if they suspect any breach of data by an insider or outsider. PHI can be used to protect patient information. A PHI stands for Protected Health Information, which includes information like demographic and individual information. PHI is found in the following areas in hospital: medical records, test results, patient information systems, X-rays, and clinic list. PHI permits disclosure of information during the patient treatment, consultations, and referrals to other healthcare providers.

Healthcare facilities can prevent data breaches by avoiding the following errors. Making sure the IT department does not ask the patients to verify their login credentials, and this can be effective if the staff are trained on how to recognize phish emails (Martin,2018)—not allowing employees to have any patient data in their laptops. In order to safeguard the client, privacy, and confidential state government and hospitals are required to develop patients’ rights. Some patient data are stolen without prior notice. Various hospitals have warned their staff to discuss patient information in public places because it is not ethically good. The following are the patient’s rights.

Patient’s Rights

• Right to access information

A patient as a right to access any information contained in the medical record (Bediako,2014).

• Right to Amend

A patient has the right to request an amendment in writing for any medical record if it contains incorrect information (Bediako, 2014).

• Right to File a Complaint

If the patients suspect their information was disclosed, they can decide to file a complaint in a court of law (Bediako,2014).

• Right to Request a Restriction

The patient may request not to be involved in any committee that exposes their health information (Bediako,2014).

The Relevance of Safeguarding Patient Privacy and Confidential Information about the Health Profession

World Health Organization defines nursing as a career or a profession that requires collaboration to provide care to individuals, families, society, and state. Nurses need to understand their profession and code of ethics. The nurse has the responsibility to protect patient rights and ensure the safety of the patient. Nurses need to follow the guidelines that guard patient privacy. All nurses involved in research should be cautious not to disclose a patient's information during the study( Haddad, & Geiger, 2019). Nurses have similar roles has soldiers; they have authority, responsibility, and the ability to make decisions with an obligation to provide minimum patient care. Authority should be exercised professionally, and all aspects of patient care should follow an ethical guideline. However, nurses are responsible for collaborating with other health professionals to protect humans and patients' rights.

Ethical Analysis and Law Practices

Some laws protect the breach of data. Anyone found violating the right to privacy can face the following charges; Inappropriate access to private data and freedom to access unauthorized private data. Higher development in technology has led to the rise of these problems. It is easier for someone to access data from a computer due the availability of some electronic devices. For example, someone can take an organization universal serial bus (USB) to access the data. The international data privacy principles can be used to safeguard data privacy( Lee, Zankl, & Chang,2016). Any organization registered with global data privacy must comply with the agency of data protection or privacy law and other legal requirements to ensure its patient’s safety. Therefore, hospitals should register with this agency to ensure their patients are protected from breach of private and confidential information.