Aspect of Law-Confidentiality

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Aspect of Law-Confidentiality

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Confidentiality is a fundamental part of nursing practice that safeguards human
rights. Protection of patient’s identifiable information including history of his past, present, or
future physical or mental health state is the duty of nursing care professional. Nurses should
inform their patients and clients about how and why their information would be used in
future. They should be responsible to uphold a person’s right to confidentiality even after he
has deceased. Nurses should provide any important information to any other health care
personnel or health agencies only if deemed necessary in patient’s interest, safety and
public protection. They should share information to patient’s relatives or family members only
if law permits and causes no harm to patient. Nurses should maintain dignity of geriatric
patients and should respect their autonomy, rights and choices (Council, 2015).
Law of confidentiality is reflective of people’s right to expect that whatever information
is disseminated by themshall only be used for the purpose for which it was given. Any
disclosure of the same shall be subjected to prior information. This includes all those
situations whereby information is either disclosed directly to the nursesor obtained from
elsewhere. An aspect of right to privacy means that an individual has access to all his health
information(Morse JM, 2015)
It is expected from nurses that they will not discuss any matter related to people
under their supervision and care, outside clinical setting.Nurses should not discuss matter
pertaining to people under their care to their fellow colleagues which might be overheard.
They should not leave patient’s records unattended making them prone to be read by any
unauthorised person resulting in breach of confidentiality (Johnston, 2015).
Caldicott committee highlighted six main principles in terms of patient’s
confidentiality(Cronquist, 2011). Firstly, justification of holding patient’s identifiable personal
information. Such information refers to any piece of information that permits accessibility to
the patient. Patient’s information should only be held when it pertains to absolute necessity.
Minimal information should be used whenever required. Access to patient’s information
should be strictly on a need- to- know standard. Responsibilities should be shouldered by