Private and Confidential? A history of concern
over the collection and use of patient
information
26 February 2015 5pm
Venue: Conference Centre Lecture Theatre (423-342)
Location: 22 Symonds Street
Host: School of Humanities
Contact info: Linda Bryder
Contact email: [email protected]
Public Lecture: School of Humanities
Dr Angus Ferguson, Lord Kelvin Adam Smith Fellow in Social Sciences, University of Glasgow.
Recent policy developments within the UK, designed to gather together patients’ primary healthcare information in centralised datasets and facilitate greater data linkage and analysis, have provoked heated debate over concerns regarding patient privacy and medical confidentiality.
In early 2014, newspaper reports of medical data being sold to insurance companies, coupled with concerns regarding the adequacy of existing governance structures tasked with oversight of research access to such datasets, forced revisions of the proposals for, and delays in the implementation of, the care.data scheme in England.
More generally, as technology changes the ways in which information is collected, stored, shared and analysed, privacy/confidentiality concerns are being raised in a variety of clinical and research contexts. While undoubtedly significant, such concerns over medical confidentiality and privacy are by no means new.
This talk will give an overview of the modern evolution of the boundaries of medical confidentiality and privacy in Britain, illustrating ways in which understandings and approaches have been shaped by individuals, interest groups, controversial issues and contingent events over the past two centuries.
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