Privacy, confidentiality, and security of healthcare information

Patients must trust doctors, their decisions and actions; this confi-dence extends to how we treat patients' information. Healthcare infor-mation should be accurate and securely stored in a readily accessible format. With the digital revolution it is increasingly simple to do this, but it is important to be mindful of just how easy it is to breach confi-dentiality. There is extensive legislation governing the use of health-care information and the Caldicott principles describe good practice. All healthcare professions have a moral, ethical, regulatory and legal duty to be familiar with these and ensure adherence in daily practice.