Clinical Information System Security Policy

8/2/2019 Clinical Information System Security Policy

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CSC 662

Computer SecurityCS2305B


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Introduction The patients information is the most important data for

clinical affairs.

ACH95 (Keeping Information Confidential)

Doctors and other clinical professionals are worried

that making personal health information more widely

available may endanger patient confidentiality


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Scope of the policy Clinician

Patient

System


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Clinician Clinician (licensed professional such as a doctor, nurse,

dentist physiotherapist or pharmacist) who has access in

the line of duty to personal health information and is

bound by a professional obligation of confidentiality.

Social workers, students, charity workers and receptionists

may access personal health information under the

supervision of a healthcare professional (but the

professional remains responsible for their conduct)


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Patient Patient(the individuals concerned or the individuals

representative)

The rules may depend on the wishes of the patient

If the patient is a child, parent or guardian of a child will be

acts on his behalf


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System System(hardware, software, communications and manual

procedures which make up a connected information

processing system)


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Threats and Vulnerabilities The ethical basis of clinical confidentiality

In GMC (General Medical Council) booklet,

Confidentiality state that doctors who record of

confidential information must ensure that it is

effectively protected against improper disclosure

The basic ethical principle, state Confidentiality is the

privilege of the patient, so only he way waive it and the

consent must be informed, voluntary and competent


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Threats and Vulnerabilities The ethical basis of clinical confidentiality

for example, patients must be made aware that

information may be shared between members of a care

team, such as a general practice or a hospital

department

There is the issue of the patient's consent to have his

record kept on a computer system at all. It is unethical to

discriminate against a patient who demands that his

records be kept on paper instead


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Threats and Vulnerabilities Other security requirements for clinical information

we also concerned with its integrity and availability

If information is corrupted, clinicians may take incorrect

decisions which harm or even kill patients.

If information is unreliable, in the sense that it couldhave been corrupted then its value as a basis for clinical

decisions is decrease


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Threats and Vulnerabilities Threats to clinical confidentiality

Experience shows that the main new threat comes from

insiders

Eg : most of the big UK banks now let any teller access

any customer's account (private detectives bribe tellers

to get account information)


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Threats and Vulnerabilities Threats to clinical confidentiality

security depends on the fragmentation and scattering

inherent in manual record systems, and these systems

are already vulnerable to private detectives ringing up

and pretending to be from another healthcare provider.


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Threats and Vulnerabilities Other security threats to clinical information

Hardware failures occasionally corrupt messages

Higher error rates could result from the spreading

practice of sending lab results as unstructured email

messages

Viruses have already destroyed clinical information, and

a virus could conceivably be written to make malicious

alterations to records

A malicious attacker might also manipulate messages


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Security Policy Principle 1 : Access control

Each identifiable clinical record shall be marked with an

access control list naming the people or groups of

people who may read it and append data to it

The system shall prevent anyone not on the access

control list from accessing the record in any way


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Security Policy Principle 2 : Record opening

A clinician may open a record with herself and the

patient on the access control list

Where a patient has been refer, she may open a record

with herself, the patient and the referring clinician on

the access control list


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Security Policy Principle 3 : Control

One of the clinicians on the access control list must be

marked as being responsible.

Only she may alter the access control list, and she may

only add other health care professionals to it


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Security Policy Principle 4 : Consent and notification

The responsible clinician must notify the patient of the

names on his record's access control list when it is

opened, of all subsequent additions, and whenever

responsibility is transferred.

His consent must also be obtained, except in emergency

case


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Security Policy Principle 5 : Persistence

No-one shall have the ability to delete clinical

information until the appropriate time period has

expired


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Security Policy Principle 6 : Attribution

All accesses to clinical records shall be marked on the

record with the subject's name, as well as the date and

time

An audit trail must also be kept of all deletions


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Security Policy Principle 7 : Information flow

Information derived from record A may be appended to

record B if and only if B's access control list is contained

in A's


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Security Policy Principle 8 : Aggregation control

There shall be effective measures to prevent the

aggregation of personal health information


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Security Policy Principle 9 : The Trusted Computing Base

Computer systems that handle personal healthinformation shall have a subsystem that enforces theabove principles in an effective way

Its effectiveness shall be subject to evaluation byindependent experts


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Conclusions Based on the experience, we can conclude that the threats

to the confidentiality, integrity and availability of personalhealth information enforced the medical sector to

developed a Clinical Information System that can give thehigh level protection to patients data.

Clinicians making decisions must be compliance with CISSPolicy


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Conclusions Nowadays, there is a lot of Clinical Information System but

still have a weakness that can cause the data of patientsspread

So we need to enhance the already system so that we cankeep the data as confidentiality


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THE END

Reference:

Dr Rose, J. A., (1996). Security in Clinical InformationSystem. Computer Laboratory University ofCambridge.

Clinical Information System Security Policy

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