Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA) officials say a privacy breach has occurred at local hospital.
CKHA officials say a record containing some health information listed on a copy of an Operating Room report was found on the front lawn of a community member on March 6, 2017.
The information contained on the report was name, date of birth, age, health card number, patient phone number, procedure and surgeon name.
No other information was contained in the report.
After a thorough investigation there was no malice intent or compromise to patient personal health information.
Each patient has been notified via letter.
CKHA officials say seven patients have been identified in this breach.
CKHA considers patients’ right to privacy to be very important and is committed to protecting patients’ privacy rights.
In order to prevent this type of incident from occurring in the future, additional privacy and security safeguards have been implemented for records disposal and shredding.
“We are committed to patient confidentiality and patient safety at CKHA,” stated Lori Marshall, president and CEO, in a press release.
“This is an unfortunate situation and we apologize to those patients affected. We are confident that after a thorough investigation we have implemented practices and procedures which will circumvent this in the future. It is our responsibility to notify the Information Privacy Commissioner and we did so as soon as we were made aware of the breach.”
If a patient has any concerns, please contact Chatham-Kent Health Alliance Privacy Office, Jackie Smith at jsmith@ckha.on.ca or 519.352.6401 ext. 5231.
