Difference between revisions of "Physician-Patient Privilege"
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The UK has a system of testimonial compulsion- meaning that a physician, though bound by ethics to keep a patient's confidentiality, must disclose such information to a court if ordered to do so. In the first case to address the physician patient privilege, Duchess of Kingston's Case, the House of Lords asserted: | The UK has a system of testimonial compulsion- meaning that a physician, though bound by ethics to keep a patient's confidentiality, must disclose such information to a court if ordered to do so. In the first case to address the physician patient privilege, Duchess of Kingston's Case, the House of Lords asserted: | ||
| − | <blockquote>If a surgeon was voluntarily to reveal these secrets, to be sure he would be guilty of a breach of honour and of great indiscretion; but, to give that information in a court of justice, which by the law of the land he is bound to do, will never be imputed to him as any indiscretion whatever.<ref>Rex v. Duchess of Kingston, 20 How. St. Tr. 355, 572-572 (1776).</ref></blockquote> | + | <blockquote>''If a surgeon was voluntarily to reveal these secrets, to be sure he would be guilty of a breach of honour and of great indiscretion; but, to give that information in a court of justice, which by the law of the land he is bound to do, will never be imputed to him as any indiscretion whatever.''<ref>Rex v. Duchess of Kingston, 20 How. St. Tr. 355, 572-572 (1776).</ref></blockquote> |
| − | Thus, there is not statutory physician-patient privilege in British civil or criminal law.<ref>Law Reform Committee (London) Privilege in Civil Proceedings 20-22 (Sixteenth Report 1967).</ref> The judge, however, does have the right to allow physicians to refuse disclosure of information that may result in a breach of an ethical duty and the information is not crucial to the case at hand.<ref>Daniel W. Shuman, The Origins of Physician Patient Privilege and Professional Secret, 39 Sw. L. J. 661 (1985).</ref> Like in the United States, in the British and Commonwealth jurisdictions, the privilege belongs to the patient, not the physician. | + | Thus, there is not statutory physician-patient privilege in British civil or criminal law.<ref>Law Reform Committee (London) Privilege in Civil Proceedings 20-22 (Sixteenth Report 1967).</ref> The judge, however, does have the right to allow physicians to refuse disclosure of information that may result in a breach of an ethical duty and the information is not crucial to the case at hand.<ref>Daniel W. Shuman, The Origins of Physician Patient Privilege and Professional Secret, 39 Sw. L. J. 661 (1985).</ref> Like in the United States, in the British and Commonwealth jurisdictions, the privilege belongs to the patient, not the physician. |
===European Court of Justice=== | ===European Court of Justice=== | ||
