Health Minister Dustin Duncan recently introduced legislative amendments that will strengthen the protection of personal health records and increase the accountability of trustees and employees in protecting those records. Trustees are individuals and organizations that have personal health information under their custody and control.
These amendments result from government’s support of recommendations from the Health Records Protection Working Group. The group’s report, released in April 2014, included recommended changes to The Health Information Protection Act (HIPA) to help enforce trustees’ responsibilities under the Act, to address possible gaps in the legislation, and to put a system in place to deal with the discovery of unsecured records.
Amendments to HIPA include:
Strict liability offence: If records are found unsecured, the trustee responsible for the records would need to show they took all reasonable steps to prevent the abandonment. Sometimes called the “reverse onus” clause, this change will forgo a need to prove the trustee intended to abandon the records.
Individual offence for willful disclosure of personal information: This change will make it clear that HIPA offences for intentional disclosure of personal health information apply not only to trustees, but to individuals who are employees of trustees.
Snooping offence: A specific offence will be established for inappropriate use of personal health information by employees who access information without a need for that information.
Take control of abandoned records: A specific provision will be added to HIPA for a system to be put in place to quickly respond to a discovery of abandoned or unsecured records and to take control of the records.
The government will examine the remaining recommendations made by the Health Records Protection Working Group, including creating a single repository for abandoned records, making private record storage solutions available and clarifying the definition of “trustee” for physician practice arrangements.
The working group included members from the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Saskatchewan Medical Association, College of Pharmacists, Saskat-che-wan Registered Nurses Association, a patient representative, and the Ministries of Justice and Health.
