KEY POINTS:
New Zealand hospitals say all transcribing of patient files is being done locally after a storm across the Tasman when it was revealed doctors in Australia are breaching privacy laws by sending their medical files overseas to be typed up cheaply.
News Ltd reported yesterday that a growing number of Australian hospitals and medical practices are outsourcing secretarial work to companies in India, Pakistan and the Philippines to save money.
News Ltd said at least four Sydney hospitals and hundreds of doctors are using cheap labour to transcribe digitally-recorded verbal notes online.
In Wellington, Capital & Coast DHB said today that from time to time it sent secretarial work to a provider based outside the district, but within New Zealand.
A C&C DHB spokesperson said dictation was sent directly from its server to the provider's server, protecting the security of the information.
"The provider has the same digital dictation system as C&C DHB. The process ensures no health information is sent through insecure internet methods -- for example via email," he said.
The spokesperson said all people who were involved in the exchange of information signed a confidentiality agreement and the process was carried out according to privacy laws.
Auckland City Hospital's external communication manager Fleur King said the hospital did not outsource its secretarial work to any external provider.
Ms King said: "We have our own medical records department and we do all the transcribing work internally."
Experts have warned that if key medical terms were mixed up by foreign workers, who often did not have English as their first language, it could prove lethal.
Canterbury District Health Board said today that it did not outsource any transcribing of patient files.
A spokeswoman said all work is done internally within the hospital departments.
- NZPA
