Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services if the territorial health authority is meeting its statutory requirements under the Health Information Act? Thank you.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we take the protection of privacy of the NWT residents seriously, and we understand the importance of protecting the personal health information, the custody and control of information. We have enhanced training for all of our custodians. We are making sure that all of our people are trained, to make sure that they understand their obligations under the Health Information Act.
There were a number of recommendations that came forward from the Privacy Commissioner. We are looking at those. We accept those recommendations. We are trying to make improvements. I have asked the department to reach out to the Privacy Commissioner to see if she could provide some guidance on what clauses she thinks need to be amended in the legislation to help improve clarity.
We take this very seriously. We are committed to having quality and professional privacy protection, and of course, the authorities are committed to protecting the privacy of our residents. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I am not sure if that was a yes, no, or a maybe, but I will ask for more specificity perhaps. This is a very progressive piece of legislation, it is a very complex piece of legislation, and it allows patients a lot of control over their information. Can the Minister confirm if there are systems currently in place to allow patients to protect the privacy of their medical information from health care practitioners?
When the rights and principles of the Health Information Act are shared with patients, they are supposed to be told that they can request to stop their information from being shared with certain practitioners. If they make that request, we do our best to make sure that happens. I can't say that every resident who has approached that understands that, which is why we are trying to improve our training; so that people can understand that.
This is new legislation. We are open to making improvements as we go. The Privacy Commissioner for the Northwest Territories has made a number of recommendations. We are reaching out to the Privacy Commissioners to make sure we have a complete comprehensive understanding of what they are suggesting so that we can continue to make this better for residents of the Northwest Territories.
Will the Minister engage with the relevant standing committee at the nearest available time to go over the kinds of changes they are contemplating, the kind of work plan that they are going over? Will the Minister commit to providing the standing committee with more information on how the department is meeting its statutory requirements under the act?
I look forward to getting a letter from committee making that request, and I look forward to following up with them in response.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister also commit to providing more clarity on the types of information systems that are being used by the health authority? Previously, I spoke of 15 different systems. I understand some are going to be retained and some are going to be rolled into one. Can the Minister provide some clarity on that or commit to providing more clarity on that? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I understand that the committee just had a review of the information Privacy Commissioner's report. There were a number of recommendations.
I am looking forward to, once again, hearing back from committee by way of letter or other correspondence indicating the types of things they want to know. If this is included in there, I will absolutely provide that information. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You're just one person.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
