Protecting Your Privacy is Important

St. Joseph’s Health Care London is responsible for protecting all personal health information under its custody and control and is committed to maintaining the highest standard of privacy and confidentiality with the information in its possession.

Collection of Personal Health Information

We collect personal health information about you in order to provide you with health care or assist in the provision of healthcare to you by other healthcare providers. We may collect this information either from you directly or, in some circumstances, from a person designated to make care decisions on your behalf. The information that we collect may include your name, date of birth, address, health history, and other records of your visits and the care that you received either at St. Joseph’s or from other healthcare providers.

Your information is used to:

• provide you with quality health care and to share with others who care for you outside St. Joseph’s such as your family physician or family health team; • receive payment for your treatment and care (e.g. from OHIP, WSIB, your private insurer, or other payors); • conduct risk management activities; • review the care we provide for quality improvement activities; • educate our health care practitioners; • conduct research to develop new treatments and technologies for the future; • to ask your opinion regarding our care on patient satisfaction surveys; • fundraise to improve our programs and services e.g. for equipment; • compile statistics for health system planning; and • to comply with legal and regulatory requirements. Your permission is required if your information is to be used for any other purpose. You may get to know other patients while in hospital - please treat their personal health information as confidential and respect their privacy. Taking photographs of other patients and staff is not permitted while in hospital. All patients, staff and affiliates have a fundamental right to have their personal health information and personal information treated in confidence.

At St. Joseph’s we pledge to:

• take steps to protect your personal health information from theft, loss or unauthorized access, copying, modification, use, disclosure or disposal; • take steps to ensure that anyone who performs services on St. Joseph’s behalf respects your privacy rights and only uses or discloses your personal health information for permitted purposes; and • promptly investigate all complaints regarding our compliance with PHIPA. All privacy complaints will be treated in a confidential manner. For more information, contact Privacy and Risk at St. Joseph’s Health Care London at 519 646-6100 ext. 65591.