A report launched today by the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) suggests that some general practices could use more practical support and training to improve their privacy policies.
The report, based on an assessment of 40 general practices selected at random throughout Australia, found four did not have an identifiable policy at hand and of those that did, only four contained appropriate contact information for individuals to submit access, correction requests or complaints to the practice.
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) President Dr Frank R Jones said the report was a timely reminder for general practices to review their privacy policies and ensure they are up to date.
“Having robust and clear privacy policies in place is the key to protecting the details of our patients and the RACGP has worked very hard to provide GPs and their practices with excellent resources that make compliance straightforward,” Dr Jones said.
During 2015 the RACGP worked with the OAIC to review, revise and improve its privacy policy template, developed for GPs to allow for editing and simple modification to suit individual general practice needs, whilst meeting the requirements of the Australian Privacy Principles (APP).
The APP privacy policy requires general practices to show and explain to their patients how they manage and keep secure their personal information.
“It is essential for GPs to have a privacy policy to explain how their patients’ personal information is collected, held, and used, so that patients can provide informed consent,” Dr Jones said.
Meeting the requirements of the Privacy Act 1988 can be a challenge.
“The RACGP provides useful resources to general practices to make adherence to the rules straightforward and our goal is to improve the practical help and support we already provide,” Dr Jones said.
“I welcome today’s report as its recommendations will lead to better privacy management within general practices and help guide them towards a more effective adherence to the legislative requirements,” Dr Jones said
The RACGP’s privacy resources, including the privacy policy template for general practices is available on the RACGP website.