REGINA – The Saskatchewan Cancer Agency says it has disciplined two employees for viewing the private health information of 48 people they were not providing care for. The information they looked at included patient names, addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth, health services numbers as well as information about diagnostic tests, medical exams, clinical results, diagnoses and physician names.
Scott Livingstone, president of the agency, says it deeply regrets that it failed to protect their privacy.
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He says the agency is working to strengthen the privacy of patients’ health information and needs to do a better job of informing staff of their obligation and responsibility towards patient privacy.
Livingstone says the two staff were reprimanded, not fired.
He says the cancer agency learned of the privacy breaches in May and began an investigation which determined the two employees viewed the health information over six months.
“We appreciate that patients have put their information in the care of our health-care professionals and we deeply regret that we have not maintained their privacy,” Livingstone said Monday in a release.
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