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[scrdest]

I'm starting to suspect Truean is so honest that it creates a corruption negative pressure zone, so things even out by everone else around her being corrupt as fuck. It's like a vortex.

[Akura]

Truean is the eye of the corporate-douchebaggery hurricane?

[Tack]

That pen better double as a vibrator, a juicer and a potato peeler.

That sounds complicated, probably unsafe and definitely unhygienic!

[hops]

Alternatively the bugger can just shoot laser.

[martinuzz]

All give up your privacy, or you might die!


Yesterday, when the water mains sprang and swallowed a street in the Netherlands, the rushing water also flooded the basement levels of a large academic hospital (VUmc).
The damage, and power circuit failure was so severe (most facilitairy services, including the hospital kitchen were shut down by the flooding) that all patients had to be evacuated (inculding a few that were just prepped for open heart surgery) and transferred to other hospitals.

Now this would not have been a problem, were it not for privacy laws.

Patients lives were at risk, because the doctors from the flooded hospital were not allowed to share medical files with the doctors in the hospitals that accomodated the evacuees without explicit consent from the patient or their guardian, because, privacy laws.

So the patients ended up being in hospitals were doctors and nurses kinda.. did not know at all what the patients were in the hospital for

Luckily no one died, but it was not a very safe situation.

Politicians are urged to propose a change to privacy laws, so that in the future, emergency situations will supercede privacy laws.

[Arx]

I think this is one of those situations where it's entirely reasonable. "You will legit die no backsies if we don't share this data on you, with or without your consent."

[martinuzz]

I think this is one of those situations where it's entirely reasonable. "You will legit die no backsies if we don't share this data on you, with or without your consent."

Doctors not willing to face huge claims and disciplinary hearings because people are assholes like that.

Great! Thanks for saving my life! Now I'll sue you for breaching privacy laws!

Or worse. "I did not want my husband, who is a doctor at that other hospital to know, that I was pregnant from the milk man"

[Frumple]

... or they're actually aware of some of the bad stuff that happens when patient's privacy isn't kept, and decided the extra immediate risk was worth not upping the risks involved with that. There's a lot more to medical records being kept closed than the risk of being sued or petty shit getting aired. Jobs at risk, lives at risk, all sorts of fraud related problems, the whole patient trust thing (which is goddamn huge)... privacy laws regarding medical information by and large exist for a ruddy reason, even if they can cause an increased medical risk in situations like the one in question.

[Arx]

... or they're actually aware of some of the bad stuff that happens when patient's privacy isn't kept, and decided the extra immediate risk was worth not upping the risks involved with that. There's a lot more to medical records being kept closed than the risk of being sued or petty shit getting aired. Jobs at risk, lives at risk, all sorts of fraud related problems, the whole patient trust thing (which is goddamn huge)... privacy laws regarding medical information by and large exist for a ruddy reason, even if they can cause an increased medical risk in situations like the in question.

Personally, given the choice I'd rather have some random doctor know that I contracted syphilis from an affair than die because that same doctor didn't know that I was in hospital because I'd had six heart attacks the day before.

I'd support laws put in to allow limited sharing of data in emergencies like this. Only on a need-to-know basis, and only in actual emergencies, though.

[Frumple]

I could see limited case stuff as a possibility, but I don't blame doctors for not going that route, either. You may not care about your history of syphilis, but you damn sure better believe someone that's transitioning or getting help for gender dysphoria in a country that's viciously transphobic cares about their medical history being kept damn tight, just as an example. Similarly, there's a number of cases where elderly or whatev' had their information shared out without consent and ended up with their lives utterly bloody ruined due to ID theft, fraud, etc. Then there's the (serious, bloody huge) problem of patients that need help, but are worried enough about what they need help for being spread out that they don't share relevant information with their doctor -- that's led not just to the person in question dying, but other people dying, too, and it can really easily (in the case of, say, mental illness problems, which news getting out about can have a person go from having a steady job and surviving to being fired, unhireable, and on the streets) lead to lives being ruined.

I'm personally pretty behind medical privacy laws having zero exception clauses behind them. There's benefits to exceptions existing, but there's also substantial enough negatives I can see just saying no, unilaterally.

[Yoink]

There was a guy at this bus stop for a while who looked disconcertingly like an Indian version of Leonardo DiCaprio.

And here I thought I was special, being served drinks by Mexican Ray Romano.

[Bouchart]

Some years ago I saw a guy at Burger King who looked like a thin Saddam Hussein.  Is that worth anything?

[Yoink]

Yes. It's worth a discount on your order if you tell them! It's like an Easter egg hunt!

[Arx]

I was thinking about this some more, and I think it could probably all be solved by adding some kind of waiver at the beginning of the hospital process that if you're being evacuated to another hospital due to an emergency and cannot continue being treated by the same doctor the hospital can send your information to the other hospital.

That way, if there's something incredibly sensitive (e.g. that you're undergoing transition in a highly transphobic country), you can choose to have no exceptions, but equally if you don't really mind and have something you're really concerned about (e.g. multiple heart attacks) you can make sure you have all possible safety.

It's probably not an ideal solution, because I'm just some person on the internet with little idea about how the hospital bureaucracy aspect of medicine works, but it looks okay to my random internet person eyes.

[Frumple]

Some years ago I saw a guy at Burger King who looked like a thin Saddam Hussein.  Is that worth anything?

Spoiler: Only if they were all there (click to show/hide)

Leviathan got bloody weird in places. And by "in places" I mean all of it. Fairly enthralling, but a manga series that definitely fits in the WTF thread.

And @Arx, that's largely what a living will is for. At least in some places, you can already have appropriate medical treatment (including information release, I do believe) dictated beforehand, to varying degrees. Just have the appropriate papers on you or filed somewhere accessible. Hospitals being a bit more proactive in informing patients they can write the things and the degree to which they can/will be followed in the jurisdiction in question would probably be a good idea in general, though, sure.

E: Though, at the same time, being in the states I'm a bit leery about the hospitals having much input or being allowed to put pressure on (potential) patients regarding such things. I would entirely expect some of the rat bastards we have running hospitals (or worse, the insurance companies) to abuse that sort of program, trying to coerce the injured or ill into preemptively agreeing to excessively expensive treatments.