Additional limits on privacy and confidentiality exist because society sometimes deems individual and collective needs more important than any individual's need for privacy or confidentiality. Examples include situations where individual or public health and safety are in danger such as threats to life or the risk of exposure to contagious diseases. The public recognizes the importance of confidentiality in health care. People are generally concerned about protecting their personal health information. The public expects that nurses will protect confidential and private information.
Nurses are often in a position to protect vulnerable patients from unauthorized disclosures.
Nurses have long recognized that preserving and protecting patient confidentiality and privacy are an integral part of nursing practice. Privacy and confidentiality have been identified in the ANA Code for Nurses as fundamental to the integrity of the nursing profession. Nurses, like other health providers, are accountable for maintaining standards of privacy and confidentiality. Nurses are key health care providers who can contribute to the development of standards, policies, and laws that protect patient health information. The increased capability and use of technology such as computers for recording, transmitting and storing sensitive patient information has far exceeded previously established safeguards for privacy and confidentiality.