An NHS Tayside nurse is under investigation after stating their ”potential involvement” with medical records found dumped in a Dundee street.
The Courier revealed last month how private and confidential NHS hospital patient notes were discovered in a bin recess in the West Port area.
The notes contained sensitive information on 22 patients from Dundee, Angus and Fife and gave their names and ages.
The papers also included details of mental health issues, heart conditions, Parkinson’s disease and cancer.
NHS Tayside immediately launched a probe into the circumstances which led to the notes ending up on the pavement beside the bins.
Now it has emerged that a member of the health board’s nursing staff could be at the root of the incident.
In a letter to Councillor Fraser Macpherson, NHS Tayside chief executive Gerry Marr said: ”A member of nursing staff has acknowledged their potential involvement in this incident, and in compliance with the NHS Tayside employee conduct policy, an investigatory hearing is in progress to gain an understanding of the events that took place.”
A health board spokeswoman confirmed the nurse has not been suspended while the investigation is carried out.
But Mr Marr said the board is treating the breach of patient confidentiality ”extremely seriously” and said it has implemented the most ”appropriate response”.
He said on first receiving the dumped notes NHS Tayside informed the Scottish Information Commissioner and immediately began a formal investigation.
He said: ”The aim of this investigation was to identify the reasons behind the loss of this document, to investigate the causal factors and to prevent a similar event from happening in the future.”
While the nurse assists the investigation, NHS Tayside has tightened up its procedures to protect sensitive information.
Mr Marr said: ”Immediate changes have been made within the clinical speciality concerned to ensure that existing protocols and procedures for information governance are revisited and that staff comply with these procedures at all times.
”This education is supported by our information governance manager to ensure that all members of NHS Tayside staff are aware of their legal responsibility to look after information and their duty to complete the mandatory InfoAware training which we provide.
”All staff have again been made aware of the NHS Scotland Code of Practice Protecting Patient Confidentiality and signposted to this document.”
Mr Macpherson said: ”What’s vitally important is that we don’t have any repetition of this in the future.”