Law 3101A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Durham Regional Police Service, Medical Record, Humber River Hospital
11 Dec 2016
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Part 1: general principles of confidentiality (a) the legal concept of confidentiality. The common law legal obligation of confidentiality is the obligation not to willingly disclose information obtained in confidence from a person without the perso(cid:374)"s consent. However, disclosure may be required by search warrants, subpoena, mandatory reporting obligations under various statutes (e. g. child and family services act for child abuse, health protection and promotion act for reporting virulent and communicable diseases), etc. Since these disclosures are not made willingly, they do not constitute breaches of confidentiality: e. g. Testifying at the trials you are not breaching confidentiality: e. g. A patient disclosing to a social worker they are worried they will get drunk and hurt their child again. The social worker has a legal obligation to report this to (cid:272)hildre(cid:374)"s aid not a breach of confidentiality. The public tends to view confidentiality as an absolute guarantee or ironclad promise of silence. Confidentiality is not a vow of silence.
