Confidentiality

The practice complies with Data Protection and Access to Medical Records legislation. Identifiable information about you will be shared with others in the following circumstances:

To provide further medical treatment for you e.g. from district nurses and hospital services.
To help you get other services e.g. from the social work department. This requires your consent.
When we have a duty to others e.g. in child protection cases. Anonymous patient information will also be used at local and national level to help the Health Board and Government plan services e.g. for diabetic care.

If you do not wish anonymous information about you to be used in such a way, please let us know.

Reception and administration staff need to access to your medical records in order to do their jobs. These members of staff are bound by the same rules of confidentiality as the medical staff. We realise that in a small island, some patients may have concerns about confidentiality. Please be assured that all our staff understand the extremely strict rules about patient confidentiality and can be trusted.

Confidentiality for patients under 16 years of age.

If you are under 16, you may be worried about talking to the doctor regarding issues relating to a sexual relationship, contraception or sexually transmitted diseases. Doctors have a duty of care and a duty of confidentiality to all patients, including under 16 year olds.

In other words, we offer the same confidentiality to all patients whether they are under 16 or not. This means we (the doctors or any staff in the practice, including the receptionists) will not tell anyone anything about you, unless we think that you are in danger of coming to harm, for example:

Someone is forcing you to have a sexual relationship against your will
Someone is hurting or harming you in another way
We think that another young person may come to harm (for example a brother or sister)

It is extremely rare to have to do this, even if what you are doing is against the law. If, as a last resort, we decide to tell someone else, such as a social worker, police officer or parent, we will tell you exactly what we are going to do first.

If you are worried about confidentiality, you can ask the doctor before you discuss your problems.