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Engaging with the public about what they do via social media

Case study: Simon is a dietitian. He has recently been considering new ways of engaging with his service users and members of the public

When social media use turns to cyber bullying

Case study: Farah is a clinical psychologist who has been complaining about colleagues to her close family and friends on social media

Disclosing information to regulators

There are a number of regulators – such as the General Medical Council, the Care Quality Commission and us – who may need you to pass on information to them

Disclosing information by law

Sometimes, you may be asked for information directly under the law – for example, if a court has ordered you to disclose the information

Disclosing information with consent

In most cases, you will need to make sure you have consent from the service user before you disclose or share any identifiable information

It is important that you get the service user’s permission, or ‘consent’, before you share or disclose their information or use it for reasons which are not related to the care or services you provide for them

Keeping information safe

You need to take all reasonable steps to protect information about service users. By ‘reasonable steps’, we mean that you need to take sensible, practical measures to make sure that you keep the information safe.

What information is confidential?

Information about a service user can be ‘identifiable’ or ‘anonymised’, by identifiable information we mean any information you hold about a service user that could identify them, you must treat this information as confidential

Introduction to confidentiality

Confidentiality means protecting personal information, this information might include details of a service user’s lifestyle, family, health or care needs which they want to be kept private