News
Minimize the Risk of Abandoned Health Records
Abandonment of health records continues to be a problem in Ontario, resulting in serious implications for the privacy of individuals and the security of their health information.
As part of a strategy to help prevent abandoned records, the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario (IPC) has developed a new fact sheet—Succession Planning to Help Prevent Abandoned Records.
The fact sheet outlines the importance of succession planning in the event that a Health Information Custodian (HIC) retires, relocates or otherwise becomes incapacitated.
The IPC recommends custodians implement the following best practices to prevent abandoned records:
- Create a succession plan that clearly identifies a successor and sets out their responsibilities, and those of any agents (such as a record storage company) who will assist with the retention, transfer or disposal of health records
- Ensure the plan identifies a person who will be responsible during the transfer of records for:
- maintaining the security of records
- responding to patients’ access requests
- making agreements with agents (such as a record storage company) setting out their duties concerning the records
- notifying patients of the transfer
- Review and update the plan on a regular basis and when there is a change in circumstances that could affect the transfer of those records to a successor
