Experts say qualified privilege legislation for doctors should be reviewed.

Since 1992, qualified privilege legislation has allowed Australian health professionals to participate in the peer review of clinical cases.

Patient health-related datasets are protected by national and state-based privacy laws that safeguard identified patient information, but these data may be accessed by third parties in accordance with the law - by statutory bodies such as the Australian Health Practitioner Regulatory Agency, or by jurisdictional health complaints commissions, and in medico-legal proceedings.

“In Australia, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians Professional Qualities Reflection is currently covered by qualified privilege and offers reassurance that Australian physician trainees’ personal reflections that may contain identified patient information are not accessible for disclosure by third parties,” writes a team led by Associate Professor Susannah Ahern, writing for the Medical Journal of Australia.

“Nevertheless, case law in Australia … allows confidentiality (as a matter of common law), alongside privacy (the overarching Privacy Act 1988 and state, territory or other information privacy statutes) to be overridden in the public interest,” they said.

“The role of qualified privilege at all levels warrants review, particularly for national qualified assurance and improvement activities.

“In particular, there should be an opportunity to consider whether the bodies that auspice large qualified improvement activities should have the ability to report or disclose information relating to clinician performance of substantial concern.

“The roles of various bodies in such a reporting process need to be determined.

“Ensuring an appropriate balance between these potentially competing professional and public interests through the further development and consideration of such models is critical and in the best interests of the medical profession and the broader community,” they concluded.