mecwacare cares about protecting the privacy of your personal information. To ensure we provide you with the correct level of service, we need to collect certain personal information, including sensitive information about you. This information enables us to provide you with care and services appropriate to your needs. Our Privacy Policy helps you understand how we handle your personal information. In this Privacy Policy ‘we’, ‘us’ or ‘our’ means MECWA trading as mecwacare ABN 59 004 927 244.
Collection and storage of information
Personal information includes any information or opinion that may identify you, such as:
- Contact information such as name, date of birth, address, telephone number, email address;
- Demographic information such as age and gender;
- Financial information such as banking and payment details or your credit card or payment details (through our third-party payment processor);
- Sensitive information including health information such as your medical history, medical diagnosis, medications you need, behaviour management plans, cognitive capacity to provide you with healthcare, aged care or disability services; and
- Additional personal information that you provide to us, directly or indirectly, through your use of our website, associated applications, associated social media platforms and/or accounts from which you permit us to collect information.
mecwacare will usually collect personal and sensitive health information about you directly, or through your representative. We may collect information from you when you apply for a service, use our website, contact us or register for one of our programs. We will only collect personal information necessary for us to respond to your requests and carry out our work supporting and caring for you. In some instances, mecwacare is required by law to collect personal information.
You have the right not to provide us with your personal information or to use a pseudonym, however, this may not be practical for the appropriate delivery of care and services. mecwacare will explain the consequences if all or part of the information is not collected.
We will store most information about you electronically. Some information will be stored in paper files. Personal information will be managed and stored in accordance with legislation. We use a range of physical, electronic and other security measures to limit access to and protect your personal information. All mecwacare employees have a duty to protect the privacy of your personal information at all times
All mecwacare services are located in Australia.
Cookies and web beacons
We may use cookies on our website from time to time. Cookies are text files placed in your computer’s browser to store your preferences. Cookies, by themselves, do not tell us your email address or other personally identifiable information. However, they do allow third parties, such as Google and Facebook, to cause our advertisements to appear on your social media and online media feeds as part of our retargeting campaigns. If and when you choose to provide our website with personal information, this information may be linked to the data stored in the cookie.
We may use web beacons on our website from time to time. Web beacons (also known as Clear GIFs) are small pieces of code placed on a web page to monitor the visitor’s behaviour and collect data about the visitor’s viewing of a web page. For example, web beacons can be used to count the number of users who visit a web page or to deliver a cookie to the browser of a visitor viewing that page.
You may change the settings on your browser to reject cookies however, this may prevent you from accessing some information on the website.
Visual and recorded information
For safe care, we take photographs of you upon admission and as needed for identification purposes. Your photograph may be included in your care records and to assist in the management of your care needs. At times, we may take photographic images of wounds to monitor the progress of a wound.
We will obtain consent before filming or photographing any client where these images are to be publicly displayed or released into the public domain.
Where closed circuit TV (CCTV) is installed at our sites for safety purposes:
- Cameras will be placed in public areas only
- Cameras will be clearly visible
- Signs will be located at each entrance to notify people that they may be under surveillance
- Monitoring and collected video will only be accessed for safety and security purposes or if required by law
- We own the data and recordings and will not release to any third party unless required by law.
If you make a telephone call to us, we may record the telephone call for record keeping, training and quality/assurance purposes. You may request that the telephone call not be recorded at the time of speaking to us. Recordings will only be accessed for safety and security purposes, to respond to a complaint or query, or if required by law.
Use and disclosure
Only personal and sensitive health information necessary for mecwacare functions and activities will be collected. mecwacare will collect information that may be used for the purpose(s) of:
- Processing and responding to the requests that you have made through our website;
- Determining the level and type of care and services resident/clients will receive;
- Provision of care and services in accordance with assessed care needs and preferences;
- Determining the level of funding that residents/clients may be entitled to receive;
- Determining the fees and charges payable;
- Internal record keeping, administrative purposes, invoicing and billing purposes;
- Seeking specialist input into care, including disclosure to your medical practitioner, pharmacist, allied health provider or other service providers. When mecwacare uses third party contractors to provide services to you, those contractors are required to comply with privacy legislation and treat your personal information with confidentiality;
- Managing an emergency situation;
- Managing, funding or monitoring the service, including internal and external compliance auditing or responding to authorised government authorities;
- Analytics, market research and to develop products, programs and services better suited to your needs and to tell you about products or services that you request or that we think might benefit you;
- Compliance with applicable laws; and
- Other uses where we obtain your specific consent.
Concerns and queries
You have the right to request access to the personal information we hold about you.
We take reasonable steps to ensure that any information we collect is accurate and complete. If you believe any information held by us is inaccurate or out of date, please let us know as soon as possible.
Requests for access and correction of personal information are to be submitted in writing to the Privacy Representative, using the mecwacare request form.
The Privacy Representative will review the application in accordance with legislation. mecwacare will respond to requests for access to personal information within 30 days after the request is made and may charge a fee in line with legislation. mecwacare will advise of the outcome of a request for access and provide a reason when your request cannot be completed.
Privacy complaints
All privacy complaints are taken seriously. If you have any concerns about mecwacare’s management of your personal information, please contact:
mecwacare Privacy Representative
1287 Malvern Road
Malvern VIC 3144
P 03 8573 4888
E privacy@mecwacare.org.au
We welcome your suggestions to improve our system at any time. If you have any queries or concerns, or wish to access your health information, please contact the mecwacare Privacy Representative.
If we do not fulfill our obligations or you are not satisfied with the response from the Privacy Representative, you can contact the Chief Executive of mecwacare.
Chief Executive
1287 Malvern Road
Malvern VIC 3144
P 03 8573 4888
E chiefexecutive@mecwacare.org.au
If after 30 days your issue is still unresolved, you have the right to take the matter up with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner on 1300 363 992.
Do you need an interpreter?
Interpreting services can be arranged by contacting the Translating and Interpreting Service (TIS National) on 131 450.
Amendments
We may, at any time and at our discretion, vary this Privacy Policy by publishing the amended Privacy Policy on our website. We recommend you check our website regularly to ensure you are aware of our current Privacy Policy.
