Patient Consent Policies

Patient Consent Policies

In a situation where authors intend to report on research that involves dissemination of personal details or images, necessary consents, permissions and releases must be obtained prior to publication in any EL-74 journal. Proper and official consents must be obtained to comply with all known privacy laws and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Acts HIPAA), 

 Privacy law (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy_law#Classification_of_privacy_laws)  “refers to the laws that deal with regulating, storing, and using of personally identifiable information of individuals, which can be collected by governments, public or private organizations, or by other individuals”. The following nations have privacy acts;  Australia, Bahamas,  Belize,  Brazil, Canada,  China,  Fiji,  France, Germany,  Greece,   Hong Kong,  India, Ireland, Jamaica, Japan, Kenya,  Mexico, New Zealand, Nigeria, Philippines,   Russia, Singapore, South Africa,  Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, Uzbekistan. The following should be noted in obtaining proper consents of patients.

1. There are special cases in which no private bio-information, address or any personal image of the patient should be used.
2. In the use of a patient’s personal information or display of his or her personal images, there must be a form of written consent that is in agreement with all concerned privacy acts and Data Protection laws. 
3. The parents or guardians of patients that are children should agree with the use of any information of the concerned child
4. The information of patients used by authors must not be in a defamatory or disrespectable manner. 

Written or formal consents are not required in the cases of x-rays, ultrasound images, pathology slides or laparoscopic images since the persons concerned cannot be identified.