Records
All interactions with any Grace Health Centre Healthcare Practitioners and affiliated staff considered within your Circle of Care are strictly confidential, including scheduling or appointment notes, all session content records, and progress notes taken during therapy. Personal patient information will be stored within Grace Health Centre's designated Electronic Medical Record system that is only accessible to Grace Health Centre's Circle of Care team. However, you may choose to give your Healthcare Practitioner with written permission to release any or specific information about you to any person or agency that you designate, including insurance companies and other third-party payers. Without the written consent of yourself or your legal guardian, no contents of the counselling sessions, whether verbal or written, may be shared with another party.
Couples who share information in individual sessions that may impact the relationship and erode safety and trust in therapy are encouraged to eventually share the information with their partner. It is impossible to rebuild relationships when explosives are laying around, and these need to be addressed when appropriate. As a result, we generally advocate a "no-secrets policy". Your therapist will provide support throughout this process.
Video Recording
Sessions may be videoed for the purpose of instruction, training, and supervision of professional helpers. It is very helpful for the team to be able to review the video after the actual session, as the additional observations help to determine the best way of enabling the patient(s)to achieve their goals. A better understanding of family themes, roles, rules, patterns, and structures often emerge during the review and affect the treatment strategy. Strict confidentiality is maintained by every team member with respect to every session. Any team member who knows the patient(s) personally will not be allowed to access their clinical information, including any videoed therapy sessions.
LIMITS OF CONFIDENTIALITY
The following is a list of exceptions:
- Duty to Warn and Protect - If you disclose a plan or threat to harm yourself, the Healthcare Practitioner must attempt to notify your family and notify legal authorities, as required by the law. In addition, if you disclose a plan to threaten or harm another person, the Healthcare Practitioner is required by law to warn the possible victim and notify legal authorities.
- Abuse of Children and Vulnerable Adults - If you disclose, or it is suspected, that there is abuse or harmful neglect of children or other vulnerable populations (i.e., the elderly, disabled/incompetent), the Healthcare Practitioner must report this information to the appropriate agency and/or legal authorities, as required by law.
- Prenatal Exposure to Controlled Substances - The Healthcare Practitioner must report any admitted prenatal exposure to controlled or other substances that could be harmful to the mother or the child.
- Minors/Guardianship - Parents or legal guardians of non-emancipated minor patients have the right to access the patients' records.
The type of information requested may include (but are not limited to) the following: types of service, dates/times of service, diagnosis, treatment plans, descriptions of impairment, progress of therapy, case notes, summaries, referrals, and investigation results.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT AND CONSENT
The undersigned acknowledges having received and read the above information and the enclosed documents, including relevant website information on www.gracehealthcentre.ca regarding counselling methodologies and general policies.