Question

You work in a women’s health clinic. A patient is informed that her test was positive for gonorrhea. You advise her to tell her sexual partner that she has this disease. She refuses to tell her husband because she is afraid he will find out she is having an affair. Later you find out that the receptionist knows the husband and has suggested to him that he might want to get tested.

Identify any ethical or legal issues involved.

If there is any legal violation, identify the conduct as civil or criminal and what law or regulation is involved.

Identify possible repercussions of this incident.

Determine if the clinic has an obligation to report this disease or if is a private matter between the patient and provider?

Answer 1

Failure to disclose an STD leads to legal misdemeanor and will influence the criminal charges and penalties and punishment

Anyone infected with STD and not disclosing to the partner is a a crime, irrespective of the partner is infected or not

Patients confidentiality must be respected all the times but it is not absolute in some situations

Most of the states law permits, but do not require doctors or any hospital personnel to share information with the sexual partners

According to GMC guidelines the information can be disclosed to the other partner if there is a doubt of information not being shared by the patient to save the partner from the serious harm. In this scenario you should also share the information with the patient that you are going to disclose the information with their partners.

In this situation the healthcare worker can inform the patients partner without revealing the patients personal details and encourage them to come for diagnosis and treatment