access to health data | “We are wasting precious time,” said the Health Commissioner

(Quebec) The main organization responsible for reviewing the performance of the health network believes that the bill to improve access to health data does not give it the freedom to fully exercise its mandate.


Health and Welfare Commissioner Joanne Castonguay argued Tuesday that Health and Social Services Information Bill 3 lacked clarity, which could affect her work and the exercise of her responsibilities independently. She demands that the law be clarified in order to limit the interpretation of the future law.

“It’s the interpretation that worries us because it hasn’t been favorable to us so far,” Frau saidme Castonguay during his address to parliamentarians on the first day of Bill 3 consultations in Quebec.

The commissioner made startling revelations when she pointed out that it took her “at least a year” to get the data she needed to “fulfill her special mandate to care for and care for the elderly during the first wave of the pandemic.” “. The Commissioner for Health and Welfare (CSBE) had to issue orders to gain access to the information as part of his investigative powers.

” [Il a fallu] two years to be able to react to the first mandate, stressed the commissioner. There are so many pressing issues [dans le réseau de la santé] that if we spend half our energy trying to gather information, we’re wasting valuable time responding to system problems. »

The “pathway” to issuing a prescription to access the data had been established in collaboration with the Régie de l’assurance maladie and the Department of Health and Social Services, she said. They cooperated while protecting information and respecting their own law, Ms.me Castonguay. With that in mind, she feels Bill 3 should give her free rein.

Please to enlightenment

“How can we believe that the CSBE can carry out such a mission with complete independence and with complete legitimacy when an organization whose performance it must evaluate has the power to deny it access to essential data to carry out its mandate ? ‘ the commissioner stated in her letter.

She calls for the law to be amended to reflect the specific nature of the mandate of certain organizations, like hers, to ensure data is transmitted. We also call for a grievance mechanism to be set up in case an application is rejected. The CSBE also wants the current obligation to destroy data obtained under a mandate to be revised.

Mme However, Castonguay stressed that Bill 3 would “remove a major obstacle” and represent “an important step in the modernization of the State of Quebec”.

The Federation of General Practitioners of Quebec (FMOQ) also welcomed the government’s intention to increase access to data, but warned that it “would in no way accept that personal information about physicians could enable the minister to potentially identify them.” identify them individually to subject them to coercive measures”.

Bill 3 – which essentially contains the elements of Bill 19, tabled by Health and Social Services Minister Christian Dubé and dead on the order paper – is now being piloted by Cybersecurity and Digital Minister Eric Cairo. The deliberations will continue on Wednesday and Thursday.

Jordan Johnson

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