Introduction

We are committed to protecting to the privacy of patient information, and to handling your personal information in a responsible manner in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988, the Privacy Amendment (Enhancing Privacy Protection) Act 2012, and the Australian Privacy Principles. This Practice Privacy Policy explains how and when we will collect, use and disclose your personal information.  It also explains how you can access that information and how to make a complaint about a breach of privacy information.

This Practice Privacy Policy is current from 15th May 2017.  From time to time we may make changes to this policy and our procedures and processes relating to yow we handle your personal information.  We will update this Policy to reflect any of these changes.  An updated copy of our Practice Privacy Policy can be accessed at the practice, or by phoning 08 8553 2037.

Collection and use of your information

This practice provides high quality continuing care for you.  In order to do so, we are required to collect sensitive information such as:

• your current and previous medical conditions
• family health history
• personal details including full name, date of birth, phone numbers, government identifiers including your Medicare number, address and email
• credit card and direct debit details

We collect this information so that we can make accurate diagnoses, provide appropriate treatment and ensure ongoing health care; and for the management of our practice.  It may be stored on our computerised medical records system and/or in hand written records.

Where possible we will only collect information from you personally, however we may also need to collect information from other sources such as treating specialists, radiologists, pathologists, hospitals and other health care providers. We collect information in various ways, such as over the phone, in writing, or in person at the practice.  Your information may be collected and handled by both medical and non-medical staff, and medical or nursing students.  In an emergency situation we may also need to collect information from your relatives or friends.

We are required by law to retain medical records for a certain period of time depending on your age at the time we provide services to you, and may retain information for longer than the period required by law.

The information we collect is used for:

• Diagnosis and treatment of your problem including communicating with practice staff, specialists and other health care providers involved in your care
• Health care prevention – including recall and reminder systems, which may be sent by sms (please let us know in writing if you wish to opt out of our reminder systems)
• Accreditation and Quality Assurance
• Billing and collection of professional fees
• For work-related or medical-legal reasons
• Student education, teaching and research