Private and Confidential? Medical records in the modern age
Private and Confidential? Medical records in the modern age
The confidentiality and privacy of medical records
in the modern information age is the subject of a public
lecture at the University of Auckland this Thursday.
Dr Angus Ferguson, a historian at the University of Glasgow, is a member of the Privacy Advisory Committee in Scotland, and is directly involved in decisions about the use of patient data for research there.
In his talk: “Private and Confidential? A history of concern over the collection and use of patient information” he will discuss how privacy and confidentiality have been recurring issues of controversy and debate in modern times as the ways in which patient information is collected, stored, shared and analysed, and its value beyond immediate diagnosis and therapy, have changed.
This was vividly illustrated by the recent response to the proposed care.data scheme in England. Intended to produce a national dataset from information contained in primary care records, the scheme’s implementation was delayed in February 2014 following media reports that patient data had been sold to insurance companies, and parliamentary concern about a lack of public awareness and information about the proposals.
Dr Ferguson’s talk will outline the evolution of medical confidentiality and privacy within the United Kingdom, including some discussion of historical links between the UK and New Zealand.
During his visit to New Zealand Dr Ferguson is collecting information about the evolution of confidentiality and privacy here, as part of a broader project comparing the evolution of approaches to medical privacy in a number of Commonwealth countries.
The talk is on Thursday 26 February, 5pm, Conference Centre Lecture Theatre (Building 423-342) 22 Symonds Street.
ends