BREACHING PATIENT CONFIDENTIALITY IS PROFESSIONAL MISCONDUCT AND ACTIONABLE By Dr. Lalit Kapoor © It is a fact that most doctors do not understand the importance of patient confidentiality, though surprisingly, they understand this easily when they themselves become patients!! Confidentiality is an integral part of the trust between patients and doctors. The assurance of confidentiality is conducive to the patient sharing the most personal information with the doctor. And this in turn potentiates oo quality treatment. Whatever conversation you have with a patient as a doctor is considered to be privileged communication and the medical information which you generate about the patient in the course of the investigations is supposed to remain confidential (with certain exceptions as we will see later). Not respecting this is a violation of the Code of Medical Ethics and an infringement of the legal rights of the patient. As a result of this,, you could find yourself in botherso...