Revised Confidentiality Guidelines
13th April, 2007
The National Cancer Registry holds the only national cancer database in the Republic of Ireland. With such a vast amount of cancer information available to it, data security and confidentiality is of paramount importance to the Registry. The Board of the NCR together with the Director consulted with a wide range of Health Service organisations before agreeing on a revised set of guidelines on the release of confidential data.
Data will be released on request provided there are no conflicts with the Registry’s obligations under the Data Protection Act 1998, (amended 2003). Confidential data will be released only with the explicit consent of the data subject. All requests for confidential information must be approved by the NCR Director and the requester must undertake to agree to certain conditions. Identifying data will never be given without patient consent.
Release of information under the Freedom of Information Act will be dealt with separately and requests should be made in writing to the Freedom of Information Officer, Ms Geraldine Finn.