Your Privacy

St Vincent’s Clinic Medical Imaging & Nuclear Medicine is committed to protecting the privacy of all patients, in compliance with NSW Privacy Legislation.

We ensure that all personal health information provided to us is managed in accordance with the Health Records and Information Privacy Act 2002 (HRIP Act) and the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (PPIP Act).

Policies and procedures are in place to ensure that information is collected, stored, used, and disclosed in a responsible way to protect the privacy of our patients.

Patients may request access to their personal health information and can update or correct information held by us.

Collecting your personal health information

To provide you with an accurate and high-quality imaging service, it is necessary for us to collect patient information and sometimes disclose this information to relevant medical practitioners and allied health practitioners involved in your care. We seek to collect information that is relevant, not excessive, accurate and not unnecessarily intrusive.

This information may include:

Referral/procedural details.
Contact details.
Medicare/Concession information.
Workers’ compensation/Motor Vehicle Accident/Veteran’s Affairs details.
Medical history.
Family medical history.
Billing/account details.

We will usually collect the information directly from you, however at times we may need to obtain information from other sources, such as:

Other medical practitioners, such as GPs and specialists.`
Hospitals.
Health care providers such as physiotherapists, chiropractors, osteopaths, podiatrists, dentists and nurses.

This information may be collected by our reception staff, technologists or radiologists. In emergency situations we may need to collect personal information from relatives or other sources where we are unable to obtain your consent.

Use & Disclosure of Your Information

St Vincent’s Clinic Medical Imaging & Nuclear Medicine may use and disclose your information for the following reasons:

To provide medical imaging and/or diagnostic procedures requested by your referring doctor.
To enable the interpretation of your results.
To provide results to your referring doctor and other doctors involved in your care.
For billing and accounting purposes.
When legally required to do so, such as when requested by subpoena.
To comply with public health legal requirements.
In meeting the basic requirements for pathology assessment/specimen analysis.
Where there may be reason to prevent serious threat to an individual’s life, health or safety and to comply with NSW regulation for public health and safety.
To meet accreditation standards, for quality assurance and complaint handling (information will be de-identified for this purpose).
Where required by your Health Insurance company or Government departments such as Medicare, the Department of Veteran Affairs and Defence.

Accessing Your Own Records

You are entitled to access your own records, or the records of another person where you are authorised to make a request on their behalf (e.g. you are the person’s legal guardian). Requests for your medical record should be made in writing to the Practice Manager info@svcmi.com.au.

You may also request that a correction be made to your record or the information on your record be explained to you. Please speak to our staff if this is required.

St Vincent’s Clinic Medical Imaging & Nuclear Medicine now offer patients their results electronically, via the secure SVCMI Patient Portal.

From 15th February 2021 your images are available on the portal soon after your scan, with your report accessible 4-6 days after reporting. Your referring physician will receive the report as soon as it has been completed by our radiologist.

We recommend that you return to your referring doctor, who is in the best position to interpret the results and explain them to you.

Security of Your Data

We take all reasonable steps to protect your personal information from misuse, interference, loss, and from unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. Records are held securely for future retrieval in accordance with applicable laws.

All access to patient data provided to other practitioners, facilities or imaging providers is logged and can be audited. This access is provided on the basis that your treating practitioners have obtained your consent to access your information.

St Vincent’s Clinic Medical Imaging & Nuclear Medicine provide access to relevant health information to St Vincent’s Hospital and St Vincent’s Private Hospital via a secure internal system. Other health professionals involved in your care may access your images and reports via a secure, web-based password-protected portal. Before being granted online access they must accept the terms set out in a User Access Agreement stating that the information is required to treat you (the patient) and that the information must be kept confidential in compliance with laws governing access, use, handling and distribution of the personal health information.

Complaints

If you have any concerns about the way that we deal with your information, please contact us in writing by sending to info@svcmi.com.au.

The complaint will be investigated, and a response will be sent to you. If you are not satisfied with the response, you can contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

Contact details

St Vincent's Clinic Suite 501, Level 5, 438 Victoria Street Darlinghurst, NSW 2010
Tel: (02) 9044 3200
Booking enquiries: referral@svmi.com.au
General enquiries: info@svcmi.com.au