Purpose

CareWell Diagnostix is founded on the ideology of providing care for one and all and has been managed by a professional, highly experienced team over many years. We believe in a philosophy of providing a top-notch and advanced environment of care for patients, which sets us apart from other institutions in the industry. Our values, mission, and vision are focused on providing a better future for our clients, guiding us in delivering prompt and straightforward results. For this Privacy Policy, CareWell Diagnostix will be referred to as “we,” “us,” “our,” or “CareWell.”

Application of the Policy

CareWell is subject to the Privacy Act 1988, which requires us to handle all your personal information according to the Australian Privacy Principles laid down within the Privacy Act. This also includes the sensitive health information we collect throughout our operations.

Overview

This Policy explains our procedure for managing personal information, the different types of information we hold, the reason for doing so, and the process of collecting, holding, using, disclosing, and disposing of the appropriate information. We are committed to protecting the privacy rights of all our stakeholders.

What is personal or sensitive information?

Personal information refers to an opinion or information regarding an individual that identifies or is capable of identifying a person based on the information, whether or not that opinion or information is true. De-identified information does not refer to personal data and involves altering or removing any other piece of information that could be used to potentially re-identify an individual.

Sensitive information deals with personal information that enjoys a higher level of protection under privacy laws. This could be about an individual’s health condition and include biometric and genetic information. Other sensitive information about criminal records, religious beliefs, professional or trade unions or trade association membership, political opinions, race or ethnic origin, and sexual practices or orientation are also classified as sensitive information. Personal information within this privacy policy also includes sensitive information.

What personal information do we collect?

We collect and hold the following types of personal information about you:

Identity-related

Including individual health identifiers, Medicare card number, name, gender, contact details, and date of birth.

Medically-related

Your clinical history includes previous test results, medications taken, and other relevant circumstances, including employment, medical, and family history.

Administrative and billing related

Including credit card numbers and insurance numbers.

Why and how is your personal information collected and held

Your personal information is collected from:

• We will contact you directly when you contact us through phone or email, book an appointment, or visit one of our clinics.
• Your referral or request form is completed by your referring healthcare provider (“Referrer”) when recommending us for providing a medical service.
• Entities or people who ask us to provide our services include your employer, a government department, any hospital where you have previously been a patient, or a trial company where you’re participating in a clinical trial.
• An individual responsible for you in some way, such as a translator, guardian, or caregiver.

When we collect your personal information from a third party, we do so with the understanding that you have given them consent to share the relevant information with us.

All personal information is stored electronically or on paper. We take steps to ensure it is protected against loss, misuse, or interference resulting from unauthorised disclosure, modification, or access. While we take every possible measure to protect your personal information, we cannot warrant or guarantee the security of any information transmitted over email or via the Internet.

What we do with your personal information

The main reason for collecting, holding, using, and disclosing your personal information is to provide our services to you (as the patient) and conduct other patient-related services. Some of these other services include communicating the results from our services to your Referrer and associated staff, other health service providers, medical specialists such as clinic or hospital nursing staff, pathology services, and other radiology/imaging companies (together referred to as “healthcare providers”) and all other applicable service providing entities and their staff (for example, insurers).
Your personal information is used to:

• Provide medical imaging and other related health services, medical opinion or diagnosis and assess your health status.
• Provide or obtain a copy of your past medical reports, images, or any other clinical information from or to a healthcare provider.
• Respond to enquiries, provide a copy of your records and conduct your identity verification.
• Upload to our digital portal according to your account permissions.
• Perform administrative services, including statistical analysis, practice accreditation, complaint handling, quality assurance, and billing services.
• Send appointment reminders.
• Provide required information to a government department or your employers if a service was requested on your behalf by a government department or your employer and
• Notify relevant organisations such as legal advisors or medical insurers in case of an incident.

Disclosure of sharing your personal information

Your personal information is shared outside CareWell for management, administrative, legal, medical, and insurance reasons, and this also includes:

• Healthcare providers and associated administrative staff engaged in patient-related services that:
  1. Have become or are involved in your healthcare.
  2. Provide advisory of a serious threat to your health and safety or any other beneficial medical reasons and
  3. Access our digital health records portal, which includes your health information (hereafter referred to as “System”). We grant healthcare providers access to our System if they have a registered account with us and accept our terms of use and access to the System.
• An authorised representative identified by you.
• Insurers such as Medicare and other third parties for accounting/billing purposes and to determine benefits payable.
• Our medical insurers and other professional advisers, as well as legal and audit teams.
• Contractors providing services to our different business operations.
• Government and regulatory authorities and other similar organisations where necessary or to any other governing body as authorised by or under Australian law, and
• Authorised research bodies under Australian law.

 

Privacy for trans-border data flows

We may host our website on servers outside Australia and use offshore technical support services to manage our daily operations. From a technical point of view, your personal information may travel electronically to another country from Australia and back again. When we send information offshore, we ensure all the engaged providers can and will observe the data handling requirements laid down by the Australian Privacy Principles.

Retaining the information

CareWell adheres strictly to the State and Territory laws to create and maintain health records and associated information. To comply with the requirements, we generally hold the data with us per the criteria below:

• If the health information was collected while the individual was an adult – for a minimum 7-year period from the last instance when we provided health services to the individual or
• If the health information collected was from an individual under the age of 18, it should be retained at least until the individual turns 25.

How we manage your personal information

We allow you to request rectifications or access your personal information anytime. We will validate your identity before we process your modification request or share the required information. It is advised that you obtain any results from your Referrer as they are familiar with your medical history and are, thus, better able to explain these results to you. If you request to receive your results, there could be delays of up to 5 days from the appointment date in providing you with the reports.

You can request access to your information by contacting any of our CareWell clinics. If your request is denied or we refuse to correct your personal data, we will inform you of the reason for doing so and advise you on further steps.

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