AIBU for wanting to report this?

[goldierocks]

I was on my way to work this morning, the train was packed due to an earlier broken down service.

The woman next to me removed a large pile of papers from her bag and was reading through them. She had an NHS lanyard round her neck (the name badge part was obscured by her bag).

We were really packed in. I wouldn't describe myself as particularly nosey, it was impossible not to see what was written on the forms. Just in case the picture doesn't come out, they said 'Inpatient Assessment - Confidential' and had a lot of personal info at the top. I've obscured this on the picture as best I could.

I have a disability which requires frequent hospital stays. I'd be mortified if my personal information was taken outside the hospital by a staff member.

Would this bother you? I feel I should report this to someone (PALS maybe) but am I overreacting?

The fact that the OP should not have posted the photo here does not mean her reporting of the event is unnecessary. If they are genuine patient records this is a very serious conduct issue.

I wonder how this works under the new GDPR regulations?

Yes, go ahead and report her! Better still, log it with the police using the 101 number as well! Even better still, post something about it on Twitter and Facebook too, so that everyone can be warned about this evil, evil person...

Or you could just mind your own business and not potentially get someone else sacked for trying to keep up with their work in every free moment. Think about it: in theory, you report this person (to whom, I don't know), there's an investigation, disciplinary procedures, she loses her job, she can't pay her mortgage and so on and so on. Too much misery there, just because you're feeling super-perfect and virtuous.

“I feel sorry for her - she is just trying to keep up with her work and some total stranger is setting out to damage her career.”

I don’t. Massive breach of rules. Maybe she can’t keep up with her workload because she keep fucking up. Like working on confidential files in a crowded, public space.

I just can't get behind this kind of whistleblowing. I'd advise to save it for something important like data privacy online or bad practice that actually affects patients. Not because you were being a nosy wotsit forced to view it on your commute!

@HollyBayTree

"I'd feel sorry for the poor woman who has to take shit loads of work home because there arent enough NHS hours in the day. (Dittos teachers ). "

Thanks, HollyBayTree....... I was going to say that as a teacher I often do marking on the train and I sometimes wonder if the passengers sitting near enough to see the pupils' names might actually know them.... but I can't see how a few execises are going to compromise pupil confidentiality in the way the woman described by the OP was doing to her patients.

I think it’s fucking atrocious that a busybody is having an issue with an NHS Worker who is probably the overworked and most certainly underpaid has taken work home with her and you have photographed it, posted it on line and want to make a complaint against her. If you were that concerned why didn’t you just have a quiet word?

If you were that concerned why didn’t you just have a quiet word?

This.

I was in a train station waiting room once and a social worker was discussing a girl on her list. She named the girls Grandmother, the mother, the father, who the child was living with and why. She named the girls nursery, the medical conditions she had. She also gave her name and office number.

While she was doing all this, I googled the nursery and wrote the address down and wrote all the other information I had gleaned from the three not quiet conversations she had about this little girl.

As I was leaving, I ripped of the sheet of paper, gave it to the woman and told her I could have reported her, but I am kind and I would not but I hope she would learn from this. She was visibly shocked and I am pretty sure would not do it again!

I think in your situation I would have pointed out all that was in full view and hoped that hit home. Too late now though.

I'm confused - are people who saw the image saying they could still read the handwritten words on it? My OCR software couldn't identify the scrubbed letters so I assumed it would be okay to post. I sincerely apologise if this was not the case.

I didn't scrub the numbers. If they were real/not training, I imagine they could be used to look up details on an NHS system. Thank you MNHQ for taking down the image.

As I said in my OP, I'm a frequent hospital inpatient. I didn't know if I was overreating, which is why I was asking for opinions.

I'm taking the feedback onboard. I still don't think it's okay to remove paperwork marked 'confidential' from the workplace. I'd be upset if a form containing medical info about me was able to be read in public* or worse still, 'lost' outside the hospital (the lady dropped the forms on the floor of the carriage when she stood up to get off the train, not relevant to my OP).

*Sorry again if you are the person whose form it was. It's probably zero consolation, but I cannot tell from your name if you are male or female.

For those who think IWBU to report this - if confidential medical information about you was accessible in a public place, would you be happy to accept 'X staff member was over-worked' as a justifiable reason?

If a person needs to take confidential work home, would you expect their employer to provide adequate data protection training?

To answer a couple of questions:

1. My disability makes having a 'quiet word' with anyone very difficult. Writing, no problem. Speach/hearing, huge issues.
2. She was wearing headphones.

Thank you for the range of opinions so far.

@littlechocola

Posters saying it was obviously for training purposes. Why do you think that?

Because when we were studying we would be put in pairs and expected to fill assessment sheets based on each other. Consultation is assessed and we were expected to treat our partner as the patient and fill the form out correctly.

I would normally say to report it but if you don't know the name of the member of staff I'm not sure what the hospital can do about it other than send an "all staff reminder" to not do this sort of thing

I can honestly say OP, that if those were my medical notes I wouldn't care. None of us are as anonymous as we think - our data is bring collected and used in all sorts of ways. Some overworked nhs employee just trying to keep up with workload, would be the least of my concerns.

Individuals may feel they wouldn't mind if it was their personally identifiable medical records being seen by strangers on a train, but that has no bearing on what is acceptable. All health care professionals are trained/updated annually and fully understand what is required of them in terms of maintaining patient confidentiality.

You think they are training notes not about real patients? What identifies these particular notes as for training purposes only? If that were the case, an investigation would uncover this and may conclude there was no case to answer.

The OP has serious and legitimate concerns. Personal insults have no place on this thread.

@Totsntantrums. Thank you. Ours were very different and had very obvious pretend names and details such as Elvis Presley, Disney land. Paris. We assessed Elvis, bugs bunny, Bob Dylan etc.

Deleted now but if you saw that you know I had a point.

Those of you talking about the poor overworked NHS worker probably don't work in the NHS and wouldn't realise how seriously this would be taken. Confidentiality is drummed into us all the time and regular IG training is mandatory. Our trust training specifically refers to public transport breaches.