Privacy Notice
West Ottawa HART Hub
West Ottawa Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) Hub (WOHH) is a collaborative service model that provides substance use health, housing and social services support to people 16 years of age and older who are concerned about their substance use.
Partner Organizations: The WOHH is led by Pinecrest Queensway Community Health Centre who works with partner organizations: Recovery Care, Montfort Renaissance, Ottawa Salus, Pathways to Recovery, and Psychiatric Survivors of Ottawa.
WOHH has a shared electronic health record. Pinecrest Queensway Community Health Centre (PQCHC) is the health information custodian for purposes of the Ontario’s health privacy law, the Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA). This means that health records are the property of PQCHC.
If you have questions about your privacy while receiving WOHH services, please do not hesitate to raise your concerns with your service provider or with Pinecrest-Queensway Community Health Centre’s Privacy Officer (Christa Janes, Director of Integrated Healthcare). The Privacy Officer can be reached by calling PQCHC’s main number: 613-820-4922.
COMMITMENT TO PRIVACY
To provide the best possible care requires us to collect and use personal health information. This information includes your date of birth, contact information, health history, family health history, details of your physical and mental health records, records of your visits, the care and support you received during those visits, results from tests and procedures. WOHH is committed to keeping your information safe and confidential. We follow the rules set out in the law regarding the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information.
To ensure the protection of your personal information, we have:
- Privacy Policies in place
- Appointed a Privacy Officer to answer your concerns or inquiries
- Set up safeguards to ensure the proper handling of paper, electronic and verbal personal health information
YOUR WOHH HEALTH RECORD
Your WOHH health record includes information relevant to your health including your date of birth, contact information, health history, family health history, details of your mental health and physical health, record of your visits to WOHH and any partner organizations, the care and support you received during those visits, results from tests and procedures, and information from other health care providers.
With limited exceptions, you have the right to access the health information WOHH partners hold about you, whether in the health record or elsewhere.
You can request a copy of your record. If you need a copy of your health record, please contact us in writing at: info@WOHH.ca, or ask your health care provider who will explain the process. In rare situations, you may be denied access to some or all of your record (with any such denial being in accordance with applicable law).
We try to keep your record accurate and up to date. Please let us know if you disagree with what is recorded, and in most cases, we will be able to make the change or otherwise we will ask you to write a statement of disagreement and we will attach that statement to your record.
CONFIDENTIALITY
Everyone who works with WOHH is bound by confidentiality. We must protect your information from loss or theft and make sure no one looks at it or does something with your information if they are not involved with your care or allowed as part of their job. If there is a privacy breach, we will tell you (and we are required by law to tell you).OUR PRACTICES
We collect, use and disclose (meaning share) your health information to:- Treat and care for you
- Provide appointment or preventative care reminders to you and/or send client surveys to you
- Update you of upcoming events, activities and programs
- Coordinate your care with your other health care providers including through shared electronic health information systems such as Connecting Ontario, and local, regional and provincial programs
- Deliver and evaluate our programs
- Plan, administer and manage our internal operations
- Be paid or process, monitor, verify or reimburse claims for payment
- Conduct risk management, error management and quality improvement activities
- Educate our staff and students
- Dispose of your information
- De-identify your information to report to funders and other stakeholders
- Seek your consent (or consent of a substitute decision-maker) where appropriate
- Respond to or initiate proceedings
- Conduct research (subject to certain rules)
- Compile statistics
- Allow for the analysis, administration and management of the health system
- Comply with legal and regulatory requirements
- Fulfill other purposes permitted or required by law
Our collection, use and disclosure (sharing) of your personal health information is done in accordance with Ontario law. When we hire technology vendors to help us, we ensure our contracts follow PHIPA.
YOUR CHOICES
You have a right to make choices and control how your health information is collected, used, and disclosed, subject to some limits.
When you register as a client with the West Ottawa HART Hub, you will be asked to sign a consent form. By signing this consent form, you:
- Agree to join West Ottawa HART Hub as a client.
- Understand that West Ottawa HART Hub is a partnership of independent organizations. You will be asked to choose from services from one or more of the partner organizations.
- Understand that personal health information may be accessed by authorized staff across partner organizations who are directly involved in your care and for other legally permitted or required administrative purposes
- Understand the legal limits of confidentiality and mandatory reporting requirements.
Before we connect with you by virtual meeting or use an artificial intelligence (AI) scribe to assist with notetaking and documentation of our encounters with you, we will explain what that means and seek your consent. The client consent form includes information about this.
There are cases where we are not allowed to assume we have your permission to share information. We may need permission to communicate with any family members or friends with whom you would like us to share information about your health (unless someone is your substitute decision-maker). We will need your permission to give your health information to your boss or to an insurance company. If you have questions, we can explain this to you.
When we require and ask for your permission, you may choose to say no. If you say yes, you may change your mind at any time. Once you say no, we will no longer share your information unless you say so. Your choice to say no may be subject to some limits.
BUT there are cases where we may collect, use or share your health information without your permission, as permitted or required by law. For example, we do not require your permission to use your information for billing, risk management or error management, or quality improvement purposes. We also do not need your permission to share your health information to keep you or someone else safe (in order to eliminate or reduce a significant risk of serious bodily harm); or to meet reporting obligations under other laws such as for health protection of communicable diseases, child safety, or safe driving.
CONSENT DIRECTIVE – LOCKBOX
You have the right to ask that we not share some or all of your health record with one or more of our WOHH partner organizations or staff members or ask us not to share your health record with one or more of your external health care providers (such as a specialist). This is known as asking for a “lockbox”. If you request restrictions on the use of and disclosure of your health record, a member of the Pinecrest Queensway Community Health Centre will explain your choices and potential repercussions for those options.WHO DECIDES
You may make your own decisions if you are “capable”. Your health care provider will decide if you are capable based on a test the law sets out. You may be capable of making some decisions and not others. If you are not capable – you will have a substitute decision-maker who will make your information decisions for you. Who can act as a substitute decision-maker and what they have to do is also set out in law. We encourage you to share information with your family and other caregivers to have supports you need. We also encourage you to ask your health care provider questions to find out more about privacy and your family and caregivers.WEBSITE COOKIES AND THE COLLECTION AND USE OF INFORMATION
PQCHC is committed to protecting the privacy of all visitors to our website and any others providing contact information. We are committed to being transparent and accountable about how we handle website user information.What type of information do you collect?
We receive, collect and store information you enter on our website or provide us in any other way. In addition, we collect the Internet Protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet. We may use software tools to measure and collect session analytics information.How do you collect information?
When you visit our website, we collect session information including page response times, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information, and methods used to browse away from the page.Why do you collect such personal information?
We collect such non-personal and personal information for the following purposes:
- To provide and operate services.
- To provide users with ongoing customer assistance.
- To create aggregated statistical data and other aggregated and/or inferred non-personal information, which we or our business partners may use to provide and improve our respective services.
- To comply with applicable laws and regulations.
How do you store, use, share and disclose your site visitors’ personal information?
Data may be stored through WordPress data storage, databases and the general WordPress applications. They store your data on secure servers behind a firewall.
How do you use cookies and other tracking tools?
Our website uses third-party services, such as Google Analytics, placing cookies through WordPress’s services. We use cookies for the following reasons:
- To provide a great experience for visitors and clients.
- To monitor and analyze the performance, operation and effectiveness of WordPress’s platform.
- To ensure our platform is secure and safe to use.
PRIVACY POLICY UPDATES
We reserve the right to modify this privacy policy at any time, so please review it frequently. Changes and clarifications will take effect immediately upon their posting on the website.FOR MORE INFORMATION OR COMPLAINTS
If you would like a copy of the Pinecrest Queensway Community Health Centre Privacy Policy, please do not hesitate to ask us for a copy.
We encourage you to contact us with any questions or concerns you might have about our privacy practices. You can reach our Privacy Officer, Christa Janes, at: 613-820-4922
If, after contacting us, you feel that your concerns have not been addressed to your satisfaction, you have the right to complain to the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario. The Commissioner can be reached at:
Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario
2 Bloor Street East, Suite 1400
Toronto, Ontario M4W 1A8
1-800-387-0073
or visit the website: www.ipc.on.ca
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