Reply To: Week 5 Topic 3 Ethics-1

[Dr.Watcharee Arunsodsai]

For the first question, If I were a health information professional, I should not tell my friend. This is miss-conduct of the regulation for data protection in general principle of data integrity and confidentiality. As Other friends said that during the diagnosis and treatment of HIV infected patients, the doctor should discuss with patients in many sessions of counseling to bring their sexual partners to check for HIV status. it would be permissible for the doctor to alert their partners in order for them to take steps to prevent transmission of infection even if the patient refuses to give consent to inform their own partners. Therefore, we can not interfere with other people or family issue. What I could do is just the recommendation of general health check-up and guidance to ensure the data safety because we are not the authorized person. Only this EMR is in the research protocol and get the permission from my friend’s husband to contact the partner after informed consent, then we have the obligation to do that.