This Privacy Statement explains how the University of Otago Ōtākou Whakaihu Waka collects, stores, uses and shares your personal information and health information when you use the services offered by the University’s Physiotherapy Clinics І Te Whare Makatea Kura Kōmiri Pai.
View details of the services provided by the Physiotherapy Clinics
The Physiotherapy Clinics take care to ensure that your personal and health information is managed in accordance with the Privacy Act 2020 and the Health Information Privacy Code 2020.
Collection of personal and health information
The Physiotherapy Clinics collect your personal information and health information to provide you with our services, including carrying out individualised assessments to help you understand your condition and guide you with your rehabilitation. In order to provide you with our services, we need to get a thorough understanding of your condition and your specific goals.
We collect personal and health information from you directly, for example when you interact with our physiotherapists during consultations. We may also obtain personal and health information about you from other sources involved in your care, where this is permitted under the Privacy Act 2020. These sources may include:
- Other healthcare providers involved in your care – such as your GP, specialists, public hospital clinicians, or other physiotherapists – who have referred you or are contributing to your treatment
- Your health insurer, where you have authorised the release of information as part of your claim process
- Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC), where your treatment relates to an ACC-covered injury or claim
This information will be used to provide you with our services and to facilitate your healthcare. We will not disclose this information to any third parties unless authorised by you.
We will also require you to complete a Patient Enrolment Form to enable us to provide you with our services. The Patient Enrolment Form requests you to provide your contact details and other personal information including your date of birth, gender, ethnicity, occupation, any special needs (e.g. hearing or visual impairment), and details of your GP. If your treatment relates to an injury at your place of work, we may also require details of your employer.
This form also obtains your consent to collect or share your health information with other health professionals that are involved in your health care.
We also create health information about you when we are delivering our services to you, such carrying out your individualised assessment and designing your rehabilitation programme.
It is not mandatory that you provide us with this personal and health information, but we may not be able to properly understand your needs or provide you with our services if you do not provide us with the information we need.
How is your personal and health information used and shared?
We make sure that your personal and health information is used and shared only in ways that support your health and wellbeing.
All Physiotherapy Clinics staff and students are required to sign a confidentiality agreement. Only Physiotherapy Clinics staff and students who are involved in providing you with our services will access your personal and health information.
However, we may also need to share some health information about you with others, where we determine that the disclosure of this information is necessary to prevent or lessen a serious threat to:
- public health or public safety; or
- the life or health of you or others
If we do need to share your health information with others:
- Where possible, we will share only anonymous information that does not identify you
- If we need to identify you, we will always try to tell you first and explain why we need to share the information
- We will share the minimum amount of information necessary to meet our objectives
- We will only ever share information with the people or agencies who really need to see it
There are also instances where we may be required to share your health information with:
- Other healthcare providers with a legitimate role in your care, such as your GP, specialists, public hospital clinicians, pharmacists and paramedics.
- Te Whatu Ora, the Ministry of Health or the local PHO, if we are required under regulation or contract to provide this information
- Other health organisations, to be used in a non-identifiable manner for health statistics to assist with health funding
- Your family/whānau, where you have authorised this or in accordance with accepted medical practice
- Your health insurer, where you have authorised this as part of your claim process
- ACC, where your treatment is provided as part of an ACC claim
- Public Health
- In the event of an emergency or serious threat to health or safety, Police, medical or hospital personnel, civil emergency services, your legal representative or nominated emergency contact person, or any other person assessed as necessary to respond to the emergency
We may also use some of your information (e.g. relating to your condition and outcomes) for our audit and research purposes; however, we will ensure that your information is first anonymised and will seek Ethics Committee approval before any research is published.
Where is your personal and health information stored?
We store all personal and health information we hold on our patient management database, Nookal - a secure cloud-based data storage platform. All paper and non-digital documents associated with the patient are scanned and stored in Nookal, and then the original is shredded. All steps will be taken to ensure unauthorised access to this information is not possible – for example by restricted access to Nookal, individual passwords and auto lock on computers.
How long is your personal and health information kept?
In compliance with the Health (Retention of Health Information) Regulations 1996, the Public Records Act 2005 and the University of Otago’s Disposal Authority, we are required to retain your health information for a minimum of 10 years after the last contact we have had with you.
Once there is no longer a need or obligation for the University to retain this information, any paper or other hard files we hold will be deleted, securely destroyed or de-identified.
Access to your information and correction
You have the right to request a copy of the information that we hold about you. If you would like to ask for a copy of your information, please contact us.
Email physiotherapy.clinic@otago.ac.nz
You may also ask us to correct or remove any information if you think it is incorrect. Please call or email the Physiotherapy Clinics with your request.
Contact details
Please contact us if you have any concerns about the collection, use or disclosure of your personal and health information.
Physiotherapy Clinics І Te Whare Makatea Kura Kōmiri Pai details:
University of Otago
Ground Floor
School of Physiotherapy Building
325 Great King Street
Central Dunedin
Tel +64 3 479 5757
Email physiotherapy.clinic@otago.ac.nz
You can also contact the University’s Privacy Officer:
Registrar and Secretary to Council
Email registrar@otago.ac.nz
Tel +64 3 479 8899