1 Feb 2011, 09:00

A man was donating blood. During a conversation with the nurse taking his blood, he established that they had a mutual friend. The man asked the nurse to pass on his regards to the mutual friend.

The nurse subsequently did so, telling the mutual friend that the nurse had met the man while the man was donating blood.

The mutual friend then told the nurse some information about the man which was relevant to whether he was a suitable blood donor. The nurse passed this information on to the blood collection agency, which wrote to the man and told him that it no longer considered him to be a suitable blood donor.

The man complained to us about the nurse telling their mutual friend that the man had donated blood.

This complaint raised issues under rule 11 of the Health Information Privacy Code 1994 ('the Code'). Rule 11 prohibits the disclosure of health information about an individual by a health agency unless one of the exceptions to rule 11 applies.

We did not think that the nurse had breached rule 11 by telling the mutual friend that the man had donated blood. We considered it reasonable for the nurse to believe that, because the man had asked the nurse to pass on his regards to their mutual friend, the man would also have been happy for the nurse to tell the mutual friend the circumstances under which they had met.

We told the man that it was our view that the nurse had not breached the Code, and closed our file.

December 2011

Disclosure of health information - disclosure to mutual friend - blood collection agency -Health Information Privacy Code 2004; Rule 11