Cancer Alliance Queensland

The Cancer Alliance Queensland has access to a vast array of Queensland’s public and private health related data, including population based cancer diagnoses, pathology, radiology, staging, death certificate, clinical and administrative cancer data systems.

About this privacy policy

This privacy policy applies to personal, sensitive and confidential information we collect, hold, use, disclose or you provide to us and how we comply with privacy obligations¹.

What is personal information?

Personal information is defined by the Information Privacy Act 2009. Put simply, it is information that identifies a living person (or could lead to them being identified).

What is sensitive information?

Sensitive information is a subset of personal information. Sensitive information includes health information and other information such as race, ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual preferences or practices and criminal records. We take additional care in our collection and handling of sensitive information.

What is confidential information?

Confidential information is information about a person who is receiving or has received a public health service. Confidential information includes care and treatment information.

Unlike personal information, which is only about a living person, confidential information can be about a living or deceased person.

Queensland laws set out requirements for how we handle confidential information.

These laws include:

Hospital and Health Boards Act 2011 (HHBA)
Public Health Act 2005 (PHA)
Information Privacy Act 2009 (IPA)

For the purpose of this policy personal, sensitive and confidential information will be referred to as confidential information.

How we use confidential information?

The Cancer Alliance Queensland collects and discloses health related information specifically for our programs of work. We also collect some personal information when people use our applications and website to improve our products and services.

Why we collect confidential information?

Statistics and information

We collect this information for a variety of reasons, including to:

conduct analysis and report cancer information
to improve the safety and quality of cancer services
to enable the evaluation, management, monitoring or planning of cancer services
undertake data linkage and integration
support clinical and health service research
develop and improve cancer statistics
to provide clinicians with data systems and tools to enable the collection of clinical data

Other purposes

We may also collect confidential information for other purposes. This includes:

users of our applications and website
members or relevant persons of Cancer Alliance Queensland committees and working groups
to distribute publications and communique

How we collect confidential information?

We collect this information:

directly from clinical and treatment systems, Queensland Cancer Register, Multidisciplinary teams via QOOL applications and the Department of Health
indirectly from health administration sources, research projects, national death index

This information is collected in various ways including:

paper based and electronic forms
electronic data files
emails or Microsoft teams
our applications and website

Types of confidential information we hold

We may collect the following types of information as we perform our work:

name, address and contact details
demographics
public and private health care facilities and providers of oncology services

We also collect and hold some sensitive information, including:

health information
race or ethnic origin
people under the age 18yrs

How we secure and dispose of confidential information

The Cancer Alliance Queensland implements security measures following the Department of Health policies and procedures¹to prevent accidental loss and from unauthorised access, use, alteration and disclosure.

We apply correct storage, handling and disposal methods so information has security classifications applied to them and are protected from unauthorised.

Electronic and paper records containing personal information are stored and protected in accordance with Queensland Health information Security Policy Framework.

We support these broader requirements with many internal policies and procedures on:

information security and privacy
data custody
submissions to HREC for projects involving personal information
access to information
data linkage
de-identifying data
release of statistical information

All our staff, contractors, medical students and visiting research officers must sign confidentiality agreements before they can access any data we hold. We only grant users with access to systems/information relevant to what they need to perform their work.

How we use and disclosure of confidential information

We only use this information to perform our work under the HHBA Act 2011 and PHA 2005 or in our capacity as an employer.

If we disclose confidential information, we do so as permitted by the HHBA Act 2011, PHA 2005 or IP Act to the following:

disclosure for research
other general disclosure
State and Territory/Commonwealth entities
other third parties such as authorised health care professionals

We may disclose personal information where:

the person has consented
the person would reasonably expect, or have been told, that we usually disclose information in a particular circumstance or to a particular person or organisation
it is required or authorised by law

When will we seek consent to disclose confidential information?

We will not use or disclose this information without consent unless:

it is disclosed or used for the purpose related to the primary purposes of collection detail and you would reasonably expect your personal information to be used or disclosed for such a purpose
if we reasonably believe that the use or disclosure is necessary to lessen or prevent a serious or imminent threat to an individual’s life, health or safety or to lessen or prevent a threat to public health or safety
if we have reason to suspect that unlawful activity has been, or is being engaged in; or
if it is required or authorised by law

We may obtain consent from an individual directly and if so it will be required in writing. In order for the consent to be valid you must be provided enough information to understand:

the type of personal information being disclosed
the purpose of the disclosure
who will be receiving the information and what it will be used for by the recipient/s
foreseeable consequences of agreeing to the disclosure

Do we transfer or disclose confidential information outside of Queensland?

From time to time, we may disclose health information, to individuals and organisations who are located outside of Queensland.

The kinds of individuals and organisations to whom we may securely transfer/disclose information outside of Queensland include third parties such as the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare or Universities conducting approved research studies. We may also disclose non identifiable information to researchers or international cancer entities in other countries.

Our applications, website and social media

When a user browses our website, we collect this information about their visit, which we use for statistical purposes:

server or IP address
date and time of visit
pages accessed and documents downloaded
search terms used
type of browser used

When a user registers for an account for access to our application, we collect the following information about the user for approving access, auditing and monitoring purposes:

personal information disclosed when registering for an account
date and time of login
pages accessed and edited

How to complain about a possible breach of privacy

We are committed to protecting your privacy. You can make a complaint if you believe we may have breached your privacy or our privacy obligations.

Send your complaint to the Senior Director of the Cancer Alliance Queensland providing your contact details.

We take all complaints seriously and are committed to quickly and fairly resolving them. If the matter is complex and takes longer to investigate that we first expected, we will keep you informed on when you will receive a response.

If you are not satisfied that we have resolved your complaint you can request that the matter is escalated for review by the Department of Health, to the Office of the Information Commissioner (OIC) Queensland.

How to contact us about privacy

If you have any questions or comments regarding this privacy policy and our privacy practices please contact: Senior Director of the Cancer Alliance Queensland CancerAllianceQld@health.qld.gov.au

Updates and availability to this policy

This Privacy Policy may be reviewed and amended from time to time to reflect changes to our practices, polices, systems and legal obligations. Any changes to this Privacy Policy will take effect from the date of posting on our website.

Some information in this policy has been referenced from the Queensland Health Privacy Policy¹

Effective date: March 2024 (Version 2.0)