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Confidential NHS documents left on bus

 

Documents relating to patients at the John Radcliffe Hospital have been found on the Oxford Tube bus service. The documents, which were marked as confidential and gave details of about 20 patients being treated at the University hospital, were apparently dropped.

An anonymous source was unable to catch the person, and consequently showed the documents to the BBC “so that the matter would be taken seriously.” She added, “I just hope this thing doesn’t happen again, if it was my gran’s name that was on the paper I wouldn’t want other people seeing information about her.” 

The hospital has stressed that the matter will be dealt with very seriously. A spokesperson told Cherwell,“Patient confidentiality is an absolute priority for the Trust. Any loss of patient information is taken extremely seriously and fully investigated.’

“We apologise for this breach of confidentiality and we are contacting each of the patients as matter of urgency to notify them. We have a rigorous process for investigating such breaches and immediate action will be taken to find out why, on this occasion, our procedures for maintaining confidentiality were not followed.’ 

“The Trust has very clear policies and procedures in place supported by staff training and we would like to reassure our patients that every effort is made to ensure patient confidentiality at all times.”

The Oxford Tube also stated that any lost property is treated extremely seriously. A spokesperson told Cherwell that anything that is found is kept by the driver in a secure location and at the end of the shift transferred to a depot where all items are dealt with. They also said that the amount of lost property varies drastically from week to week but that items of this type were a rarity.

Students have reacted to the news with concern, with second year Mona Damian commenting, “Understandably accidents do happen, but documents of such sensitivity should surely not even leave the hospital.”

It is uncertain when the documents were found. They were handed back to the Trust on Wednesday.

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