Category: FHTs

The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario wrote a recent blog post “Privacy is not a Barrier to Releasing Non-Identifying Statistics“. In particular, the IPC noted an example that the public wants to know how serious the flu-threat is in their community, a risk often measured by the number of local flu-related deaths.  Public members have… Read more »

There are three new decisions of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario under the health privacy legislation. That brings the total number of Orders and Decisions of the IPC to 67. You can read my summary of all 67 IPC PHIPA Decisions Bottom Line: There are no surprises here.  All three decisions upheld the decisions of the custodians. … Read more »

Health care organizations of all shapes and sizes deal with volatile situations involving patients (or clients or residents) and family members or caregivers. Remember this case from last year of the woman at a health clinic who was yelling racist comments about wanting to see a “white doctor” and getting increasingly angry that only “brown doctors with… Read more »

I’ve delivered five team privacy training sessions for health care groups this month all over the province. One thing that has everyone talking is the new requirement to track privacy breaches and report the statistics to the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario in 2019. Here are some tools and tips to help you better… Read more »

On Friday January 12, the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario released four new decisions. Here is my updated summary of all 64  IPC PHIPA Decisions Decision 61: Reasonable Search: A physician received a request for access to all records relating to the complainant’s deceased son. The complainant believed additional records should exist. The physician said… Read more »

Just a reminder that as of January 1, 2018 if you are a health information custodian you need to start keeping track of certain information relating to privacy breaches. The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario released guidelines that will come into effect March 2019 but require you to start tracking certain kinds of privacy breaches now…. Read more »

The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario released four new PHIPA decisions today. These are relevant to any health care organization in Ontario. Read the summaries of all 60 IPC PHIPA Decisions here. Decision 57: A patient made an access request at a hospital. The patient wanted to know why he was being told by physicians at the… Read more »

If you are a CEO or ED of a healthcare organization, you need to talk to your board about risk. How do you do it without scaring them or boring them? You make risk real. You explain real situations that have happened to similar organizations. Here are a couple of pointers: Give them a risk architecture:… Read more »

Have you seen this tool from HIROC – the Health Insurance Reciprocal of Canada? Cyber-Guide If you are a Privacy Officer in healthcare – you should read this tool.  It’s great. It’s brand new – November 2017. You may have a vague understanding of words like “ransomware” and “phishing” and “social engineering“.  And maybe you… Read more »

The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario released new guidelines that will come into effect March 2019 but require healthcare organizations to start tracking certain kinds of privacy breaches as of January 2018. Click here for the Annual Reporting of Privacy Breach Statistics to the Commissioner guidelines. Starting January 1st, Ontario’s healthcare organizations (all those who… Read more »