My hospital made a mistake and here’s what I did about it!

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You may think to yourself we here at Jinga Life sound like a broken record when we mention GDPR and owning your data as a patient. But, we have encountered many Jingas who have told us of their less than pleasant experiences when it comes to healthcare.

It has been in the news on and off for decades; healthcare workers are often overworked. The amount of patients any healthcare professional deals with in a given day can be staggering. Whilst our doctors and nurses are amazing, they aren’t superhuman, they can make errors - just like everybody else.

One of our lovely Jingas reached out to tell her story of a mix up in her Consultant’s office that could have lead to a very stressful time for her and her family...

Chris McMillan had been going to her Consultant for years, so they were very well acquainted.

After an operation, Chris had to undergo certain routine tests every 6 months, after which she would visit her Consultant to go through the results of said tests. These visits were standard and usually non-eventful.

However, on this particular occasion something went astray to the usual proceedings. Upon entering the Consultant’s office she could see her file was on the desk. The file had been placed there by the secretary in advance of her consultation as per usual.

As Chris took her seat, the Consultant proceeded to read through the file, giving her the results of the most recent tests.

During the session, Chris became puzzled as to why her Consultant was giving the results of tests she had quite a while back, and not her most recent ones. The Consultant’s line of questioning was a little off, and so Chris was puzzled further. Curious as to what was going on, Chris looked down at the file and could see that yes, her name was on the file, but the address was not Dun Laoghaire (where Chris lives), but rather Blackrock.

“Are you sure this is my file Doctor?”, she asked.

Upon further inspection, the Consultant realised that this was indeed somebody else’s file, apologised profusely, and asked his secretary to bring the correct file.

On these events Chris says “If I, the patient, had not noticed that the file was incorrect and my Doctor had delivered bad news to me from the file, much distress could have been caused to me and my family. And how would the other Chris McMillan have felt that her file was being discussed with another patient? Not so impressed I would imagine!”

Chris notes that this incident has made her so much more aware that everyone needs to take control of their own health records and not to rely on their clinician, as mistakes can always be made.

On telling a friend of this incident, Chris was introduced to the fully GDPR compliant, Jinga Life. Chris now uses Jinga Life, and has told all of her friends and family to do the same! She now has all of her health records with her on her smartphone so when she goes to see her consultant (or her GP or dentist) she has all her medical history stored in Jinga Life! As well as this, Chris stores all her blood test results and scans on Jinga Life. Now, whenever she is asked a question by her clinician, she literally has the answer in the palm of her hand!

“Jinga Life gives me control over my own health records and gives me peace of mind that they are stored in a safe and secure environment”.