Reply To: Request for Advice Doctor Won’t Prescribe

[deebee]

This law trumps patient privacy laws. From the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care website, Public Information section:

Section 8 of the Act permits the Minister and the Executive Officer to direct a prescriber (e.g., doctor, dentist), a dispenser (e.g., pharmacist) or an operator of a pharmacy to disclose information about the monitored drugs they prescribe or dispense, to the Minister or the Executive Officer. For example, the Minister and the Executive Officer may direct the disclosure of information regarding:

the prescriber of the monitored drug (name, address, registration number),
the person for whom the monitored drug is prescribed (name, address, date of birth, gender, unique number appearing on a form of identification listed on the ministry’s website), and
the monitored drug itself (name, strength, quantity, length of therapy, directions for use, drug identification number, prescription number, date of prescription, date of dispensing).

In addition, if a person who has been prescribed a monitored drug authorizes someone else to pick up the drug from a dispenser, the Minister or the Executive Officer may direct a dispenser to disclose certain personal information about that person to the Minister or the Executive Officer (i.e. the person’s name and address, and the distinguishing number appearing on a form of identification that verifies the person’s name and address).

Once this information has been collected, the Minister and Executive Officer may only use or disclose it as permitted or required by the Act, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, and the Personal Health Information Protection Act, 2004. For example, subsection 5(5) of the Act permits the Minister and the Executive Officer to disclose personal information about a person who has been prescribed a monitored drug, to a prescriber, a dispenser or an operator of a pharmacy who has prescribed or dispensed such a drug to the person in the past.

You’re right; doctors don’t have access, but the gub’mint does. The clearest thing I’ve read is the monitoring FAQ at

Sorry if I’ve botched the HTML again.

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