Nova Scotians’ paper health records are being moved to Ontario to be digitized

Nova Scotia Health is moving boxes of Nova Scotians’ paper health records to Ontario to be digitized by a private company.

A Nova Scotia Health employee who spoke to CBC News said 900 boxes of records were to be taken to Iron Mountain in Toronto to be scanned and converted into electronic form. CBC has agreed not to name the employee out of concern that their jobs could be at risk if they were identified.

“The public needs to know. Nova Scotia patients need to know that their central sector records are not where they should be,” the staffer said.

The employee said sending files out of the province could put patients’ health at risk.

Under normal circumstances, for example, if a patient goes to the emergency department, a physician or surgeon may request that the patient’s records be retrieved and made available within 24 hours.

But if records are in transit to another province, or awaiting scanning, the delay could impact a patient’s treatment and outcome, the employee said.

“You don’t want to think about it, but you know, given the scenario, it could have been death. This is patient care. It’s not just paper. It’s the patient’s record… It’s negligence if I’m honest.”

The employee said that taking a work out contract is unnecessary.

“We have people in the province who are willing and able to do the work. So if there was a scheduling issue or a recruiting issue, management should have addressed that from the beginning.”

Connection to OPOR

The employee said he believes there is a push to digitize the backlogGram of 22,000-inch record – approximately 56,000 centimeters, or more than half a kilometer if the record is Held in the pile – relates to One Person One Record (OPOR), which is scheduled to launch in the central region in early May.

OPOR is an electronic record-keeping system intended to replace paper records and reduce the number of programs used by health professionals to track patient health information. OPOR began at the IWK Health Center in December but will eventually expand across the province.

Nova Scotia Health said trucking boxes in Ontario is “not an individual one-record initiative” and the health authority regularly does business with Iron Mountain Canada, a subsidiary of U.S. company Iron Mountain Inc.

The health authority did not make anyone available for an interview, but in a statement, spokesman Brendan Elliott said Nova Scotia Health has used Iron Mountain for several years for maintaining, destroying and “most recently, scanning of paper records.”

Elliott said sending and receiving paper and digital records interprovincially has been a standard practice for at least 10 years, but this is the first time the health authority has done this with Iron Mountain.

So far, Nova Scotia Health has sent 10 boxes to Ontario to test the process, but “larger quantities” of records will be sent in the future, Elliott said.

concern of union

The plan has worried the Nova Scotia government and the General Employees Union, which represents Nova Scotia health workers who are typically responsible for scanning paper records and converting them to electronic form.

NSGEU President Sandra Mullen says the health authority has done this before The consortium confirmed that it needed to convert 22,000 inches of documents.

Mullen said the plan could put Nova Scotians’ personal health information at risk.

“If they are taking our personal records and information and sending them by truck to another province in the winter, there is a serious risk of loss and a breach of privacy,” he said.

The union is also raising the issue of handing over the work of its members to the private sector.

“I can’t imagine why we would even consider shipping documents out of Nova Scotia when we have a number of staff in this province who can do that work,” Mullen said.

The union said many of its members are willing and able to work overtime to process the files.

Mullen said the scanners the health authority uses to convert records don’t always work properly, and more scanners would be helpful in speeding up the conversion process.

NSGEU has filed a complaint with Nova Scotia Health regarding the outsourcing of work.

NSH responds to concerns

Nova Scotia Health said that as of Jan. 15, the backlog was estimated to be 15,000 inches, but that figure changes daily depending on staff availability, the number of patient interactions and other factors.

Elliott said the health authority has increased staffing, offered overtime and transferred work to other areas within the province in an effort to reduce the backlog.

He said the records are being sent to Ontario because “the backlog impacts Nova Scotia Health’s ability to provide timely medical information to both the patient and their care team.”

Asked if there were privacy concerns about sending paper records out of the province, Elliott said, no, because Iron Mountain has transported records securely for many years.

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