HIE Wire   back to index

From bjhc&im: Br J Healthcare Comput Info Manage 2001; 18(6): 5

A model Code of Ethics for Health Informatics Professionals has been drafted by the multinational Working Group on Data Protection in Health Information Systems of the International Medical Informatics Association.

The Code has been compiled to help guide healthcare informaticians through those increasingly common situations where the nature of their role subjects them
to conflicting ethical constraints.

Healthcare informaticians have a unique facilitating role in the planning and delivery of healthcare, part of which is centred on the relationship between the electronic patient record and the subject of that record. Alongside the ethical practices associated with patient confidentiality and privacy, healthcare informaticians are also subject to considerations arising from their interactions with clinicians, the healthcare management professions, healthcare institutions and other agencies. These constraints often pull in different directions.

The newly tailored Code is prefaced by a brief statement of fundamental ethical principles that govern human conduct in general, which are: autonomy, equality and justice, beneficence, non-malfeasance, impossibility and integrity. This is followed by a section on general principles of informatics ethics and then the main body of the document, in six subsections, detailing the proposed rules of ethical conduct.

Ensuring that the data subject of an electronic medical record is aware of its existence, who has access to it and for what purpose, and their rights regarding its content and use, feature in the subject-centred duties.

Copies of the draft Code may be obtained from the UK’s representative to IMIA, Peter Murray (peter@nursing-informatics.net).