16 Sep 2013, 11:55

We received a complaint from a mother who had requested her child’s health information from a medical clinic. The clinic had declined to provide the information because the child’s father did not want the information to be released.

This complaint raised issues under the Health Information Privacy Code (“the Code”) and the Health Act 1956 (“the Health Act”).

The Code and Health Act

Under section 22F of the Health Act, parents and guardians are permitted to request their child’s health information, if the child is under 16 years old.

Where an agency receives a request under section 22F it is required to treat that request as if the person had requested their own information under the Code.

This means that the agency must release the information unless a withholding ground applies.

Where a withholding ground applies, the agency may withhold the information if it wishes.  Information may be withheld where:

-      the child does not want the information to be disclosed;

-      it would not be in the child’s best interests to disclose the information; or

-      one of the withholding grounds in sections 27-29 of the Privacy Act applies.

We contacted the clinic to ask why it had refused the mother’s request for her child’s health information.

The clinic advised that the child’s mother and father had separated, and the father had custody of the child.

While the clinic was willing to provide the child with information that was only about the child, it did not want to disclose any information contained in the file relating to the father out of concern for his privacy.

We reviewed the file and formed the view that most of the information was about the child and the mother was entitled to it.  However, there was a small amount of mixed information about the child and the child’s father.

Under section 29(1)(a) of the Privacy Act an agency can withhold information if releasing it would involve the unwarranted disclosure of someone else’s information.

Given the nature of the information, and the difficult relationship between the mother and the father, we were satisfied that it would be unwarranted to provide this to the mother.

The clinic provided the remaining information from the file to the mother.  She was satisfied with the information that was provided and the file was closed on this basis.

September 2013

Request for child’s health information – withholding grounds – Privacy Act 1993, s29(1)(a); Health Act 1956, s22F