Family Practice Advance Access originally published online on June 4, 2009
Family Practice 2009 26(5):344-350; doi:10.1093/fampra/cmp032
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Confidentiality and the telephone in family practice: a qualitative study of the views of patients, clinicians and administrative staff
a General Practice Section, Centre for Population Health Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh
b Centre for Rural Health, University of Aberdeen, Inverness, UK
Correspondence to Brian McKinstry, General Practice Section, Centre for Population Health Sciences, University of Edinburgh, 20 West Richmond Street, Edinburgh EH8 9DR, UK; E-mail: brian.mckinstry{at}ed.ac.uk
Received 11 December 2008; Revised 18 April 2009; Accepted 1 May 2009.
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Abstract |
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Background. Confidentiality is considered a cornerstone of the medical consultation. However, the telephone, previously used mainly to negotiate appointments, has become increasingly employed as a means of consultation and may pose new problems in respect to maintaining confidentiality.
Objective. As part of a qualitative investigation into the views of patients, doctors, nurses and administrative staff on the use of telephone consulting in general practice, we set out to explore the impact of the use of this medium on perceptions of confidentiality.
Method. We used focus groups of purposively selected patients, clinicians and administrative staff in urban and rural areas.
Results. Fifteen focus groups comprising 91 individuals were convened. Participants concerns centred on overheard conversations, the receptionist role in triage, difficulty of maintaining confidentiality in small close-knit communities, errors in identification, third party conversations and answering machines. Telephone consulting, depending on the circumstances, could pose a risk or offer a solution to maintaining confidentiality.
Conclusions. Many of the concerns that patients and health care staff have around confidentiality breaches both on the telephone and face to face are amenable to careful management. Although rare, identification error or fraud can be a potentially serious problem and further thought needs to be given to the problem of misidentification on the telephone and the use of passwords considered.
Keywords. Access, confidentiality, evaluation, health care quality, physician–patient relations, telephone consulting.
McKinstry B, Watson P, Pinnock H, Heaney D and Sheikh A. Confidentiality and the telephone in family practice: a qualitative study of the views of patients, clinicians and administrative staff. Family Practice 2009; 26: 344–350.