Abstract
Confidentiality, one of the single most important jobs that a medical professional has. Confidentiality breaches happen throughout different companies and professions, not just in the medical field. Patients put their trust in their medical providers to ensure that their information is being protected to the best of their abilities. To insure that patient information stays confidential, factors and policies have been put into place to help with this. The most common confidential and privacy act is HIPPA, but policies such as nonmaleficence, beneficence, autonomy, justice, and privacy/confidentiality (Silva, M., 2017). The author also shares a personal situation that she has come across in her medical profession, and explains why, she …show more content…
A mnemonic device to remember the exceptions to the duty of confidentiality is the “Five C’s.” Which are: Consent – a clinician may release confidential information with the consent of the patient or a legally authorized surrogate decision maker, such as a parent, guardian, or other surrogate designated by an advanced medical directive; Court Order - A clinician may release confidential information upon the receipt of an order by a court of competent jurisdiction. (Note: Unless issued by a judge, a subpoena should not be considered the equivalent of a court order in many jurisdictions.); Continued Treatment- A clinician may release confidential information necessary for the continued treatment of a patient. (This exception is also recognized by HIPAA, subject to the “minimum necessary” rule of limited disclosure; Comply with the Law - A clinician may reveal confidential information in order to comply with mandatory reporting statutes (e.g., child abuse), law enforcement or administrative agency investigations, business operations, and other such lawful purposes; and Communicate a Threat - This is the well-known Tarasoff exception to confidentiality that involves the clinician's duty to protect others from violence by a patient. The Tarasoff exception exists in a variety of forms in many jurisdictions …show more content…
The author is a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) who has encountered breaching of patients confidential records on a few occasions. For example, the author was approached her first day off of CNA orientation by a physician who demanded to know how his/her patient was doing from a medical stand point. The author refused to give out any information about the patient because the author didn’t know that the physician standing in the patient’s room was in fact, a physician. In the authors defense, she had never worked with this particular physician before, and the physician wasn’t wearing a name badge, just a