Policies

Overview

This practice is committed to complying with the Privacy Act 1988 and the Australian Privacy Principles 2014 and the privacy provisions of all applicable legislation. This privacy policy covers all personal information we hold, that is, information, or an opinion about an individual, whose identity is apparent, or can be reasonably ascertained, from that information or opinion. This includes information we have collected from people through our office, over the phone and over the internet.

What kind of personal information do we collect about you?

We collect and hold the following kind of information about you:

• your name, address, date of birth, email and contact details
• information about your family or relatives
• information about how you came to use our service
• information from and about other health professionals involved in your care
• any government identifiers such as Medicare number, DVA number. However, we do not use these for the purposes of identifying you in our practice
• other health information about you such as: a record of your symptoms, your relevant medical history, the diagnosis made and the treatment we give you:
  • specialist reports
  • test results
  • your appointment and billing details
  • the medication you take
  • your healthcare identifier
  • your health fund details
  • information to help to help us tailor our service to your personal needs such as your occupation, activities and health goals
  • other information about you collected for the purposes of providing care to you.

How do we collect and hold your personal information?

We will generally collect personal information about you in these ways:

• directly from you when you give us your details (eg, face-to-face, over the phone, via registration form or an online form).
• from a person responsible for you.
• from a third party where we are permitted by law to do that (eg. other health care professionals involved in your care, from your health insurer, from the My Health Record system etc.).
• consultations are generally conducted in individual rooms as are phone calls from clinicians. We run sessions from our studios, gyms and a public pool. In this environment privacy is likely to be less.
• when you call, receive a call or deal with reception this is undertaken in a public place. Please inform staff if extra privacy is required.

Why do we collect and use information about you?

We primarily collect and use personal information about you to provide our healthcare services to you and to communicate with you and others involved in your care in relation to those services.

We also sometimes use that information for other purposes, including:

• to help us manage our accounts and administrative services, including billing, arrangements with health funds, pursuing unpaid accounts, management of our IT systems and
• to conduct accreditation, quality assurance or internal audits.

Where an individual chooses not to provide requested information, we can advise that individual of what consequences this non-disclosure may have. For example, withholding certain information may limit our ability to provide relevant offers or services to individuals. In some cases withholding information from your clinician may impact the clinician’s ability to manage your condition effectively.

When and why might we share information about you with others?

We may disclose information about you to others outside of our practice as permitted or required under law. This will include situations where we disclose information about you in order:

• to comply with our legal obligations (eg. mandatory reporting under legislation, responding to a court order or subpoena)
• to consult with other health professionals involved in your healthcare
• to get test results from diagnostic and pathology services
• to claim on insurance
• to communicate with your health fund, with government and other regulatory bodies such as Medicare
• to help us manage our accounts and administrative services (eg. billing or debt recovery, arrangements with health funds, pursuing unpaid accounts etc.)
• to lessen or prevent a serious threat to a patient’s life, health or safety or a serious threat to public health or safety
• to help in locating a missing person
• We may upload or access your My Health Record. We will ask for your consent each time we access your My Health Record.
• to prepare the defence of anticipated or existing legal proceedings
• to discharge notification obligations to liability insurers.
• In the course of our business activities, we may need to disclose some of your personal information to relevant staff.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Some clinicians at this clinic use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to help with record taking. AI records the conversation during a consultation and generates a written summary for the clinician. The clinician then uses this summary to help create a medical record. The recording is not kept by the system. The use of AI can allow the clinician to focus more on the consultation and less on note taking. The use of AI during a consultation is completely voluntary. You can ask for the recording to be paused or stopped at anytime during the consultation even if you have previously agreed to its use.

Our clinical note taking and AI service is provided by PracSuite. Their policy is to handle data in accordance with Australian Privacy Principes based on the “Privacy Act 1988” and use Australian based hosting. Their privacy policy can be found here: pracsuite.com/privacy

Unauthorised disclosure or access

Our practice is committed to protecting the privacy of individuals, we will view unauthorised disclosure of, or access to, personal information by our employees or contractors, as a serious breach of this policy. Appropriate action (which may include disciplinary or legal action) will be taken in such cases.

Opt-out

To stop receiving emailed product offers use the unsubscribe option at the end of the email. In the rare case this does not work please contact reception directly.

Access to personal information

Individuals will be able to access their personal information upon request. However, our practice may occasionally need to deny access to information in accordance with the exemptions contained in the Act. We may charge a small fee to access our records. We will normally respond to your request within 30 days. To make the request, you should contact reception.

If you think that the information we hold about you is not correct, let us know in writing. We will take reasonable steps to correct your personal information where the information is not accurate or up-to-date. From time to time, we may also ask you to verify that the information we hold about you is correct and current. And please notify us if and when your contact details change (see ‘how to contact us’).

Security

Our goal is to protect the personal information collected by our practice and its associations. We take reasonable steps to protect the information we hold about you. These are designed to prevent unauthorised access, modification or disclosure and to prevent misuse and loss.
This includes:

• holding information in a lockable cabinet
• holding information on an encrypted database
• holding information in secure Cloud based storage
• providing staff with training or induction etc. about confidentiality and security issues

Your right to receive treatment from us anonymously (or by using a pseudonym)

Where it is lawful and practicable for us to do so, you can be treated anonymously or through use of a pseudonym (a name other than yours that is not for the purpose of impersonating another person or fraud). This is likely to negatively impact your ability to claim through insurance. We will require payment prior to providing services.

Video recording

We collect video information in public areas of our premises. This information is used for crime management and for matters of public benefit.

Data quality

We will take all reasonable steps to ensure that the data we collect, use or disclose is accurate, complete and up to date, and has been obtained directly from individuals or other reputable sources.

Privacy inquiries

Privacy related inquiries or concerns can be directed to our practice.

Availability and review of policy

We will make our privacy policy available upon request. This policy will be reviewed from time to time and any amendments will be incorporated into the updated policy. Please check our web site for the most up to date copy.

How to Contact us

Message: Our contacts page

Phone: 03 98788088

Fax: 03 9878 2269

Bellbird Sports & Spinal
2 Darook Street,
Blackburn South VIC 3130