Privacy policy

We are committed to protecting the privacy and confidentiality of clients and their families. 

Jarrah House is bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles, as well as the Health Records and Information Privacy Act 2002 (NSW) and Health Privacy Principles, which govern the handling of health information in NSW. 

If you have any queries relating to the how we handle/have handled your personal or health information, please contact us on (02) 9661 6555 and ask for the Nurse Manager.

Why does Jarrah House collect and use your health or personal information?

We may do this for several purposes, including:

• Enquiries: to respond to your enquiries about our programs
• Referrals: to respond to referrals to our programs, or to refer you to other programs or services
• Treatment: to provide you with the best treatment and to assess whether Jarrah House has the treatment resources to provide you the best care.
• Support services: to provide you with information and support services, and to evaluate and report on these services.
• Funding and management: government funding, staffing and resource management (such as accommodation, equipment and resources required to provide treatments), ensuring the safety of Jarrah House and its residents, responding to complaints, evaluation of our programs and services, audits, compliance with laws
• Research: to conduct and/or fund research, as well as prevention, diagnosis and treatment (however your health information would be de-identified for this purpose)

What happens if you don’t provide all this information?

You are free to provide (or not provide) any information you choose.  However, if you do not provide some or all of the information requested, Jarrah House may not be able to offer you some services or provide you with appropriate care (we may have to refer you to another service).

How does Jarrah House collect your personal or health information?

Where possible, Jarrah House will collect your personal and health information directly from you.

We also obtain personal and health information from third parties such as government departments and other health professionals, social and community workers.  If we collect information about you from a third party and it is unclear whether you have consented to the disclosure of your personal or health information to us, we will take reasonable steps to notify you of the collection.

We may also collect personal or health information about third parties from you, such as information about your children, partner, or other family members.  Where you provide personal or health information of a third party who is over the age of 16, you must have their consent to provide that information, and it is your responsibility to ensure that they, understand it and agree to accept it. 

Where you provide personal or health information of a third party who is under the age of 16, you must ensure that you are entitled to provide such information on their behalf (for example you are their parent).  Health or personal information about those third parties will be dealt with in accordance with applicable laws and the Jarrah House Privacy Policy.

To whom does Jarrah House disclose your personal or health information?

We may need to disclose your personal or health information to others to carry out our activities. This may include:

• External support services: to health care professionals (for example your GP, psychiatrist, or other facility that is going to take over your care), lawyers, other professionals, counsellors, funders, government bodies, co-ordinators, volunteers, students, service providers, agencies and not-for-profits that provide support services
• Government departments and bodies: for example, Health, Family and Community Services, the police, Communities and Justice, and Human Services
• Researchers: to conduct research studies on addiction, as well as diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation
• Contractors and service providers: who perform services on our behalf, such as information technology services providers (including offshore cloud computing service providers), database contractors.

Jarrah House may also use your health and personal information for statistics, teaching or funding purposes.  Where practical, we will de-identify any information disclosed for those purposes.

Where is your personal and health information stored?

Your personal and health information is stored in both hard copy and electronic form.  Information stored electronically is password protected, which may be a Jarrah House database, a database maintained by a cloud hosting service provider or other third party database storage or server provider.  Backups of electronic information may also be made and stored in a similar manner. 

Hard copy information is generally stored in our offices, which are secured to prevent access by unauthorised people.  It may be stored for a time with a third party for specific purposes.

We will retain any health information for seven years after we last provided a health service to you.  If a health service was provided to a person under 18, we will retain that health information until they reach the age of 25.  This information may be archived or stored with a third party service provider.  We will destroy or de-identify personal information which is not health information after we no longer need it for the purposes for which we could use or disclose it. 

Where personal or health information is stored with a third party, we have arrangements which require those third parties to maintain the security of the information.  We take reasonable steps to protect the privacy and security of that information, but we are not liable for any unauthorised access or use of that information.

Due to the complexity of Jarrah House’s operations, your health and personal information may be stored simultaneously in more than one database or location.

Access to your personal and health information

Jarrah House will, upon your request, and subject to applicable privacy laws, provide you with access to your health and personal information (or a third party for whom you are responsible at the time of request, such as your child) that is held by us.  However, we request that you identify, as clearly as possible, the type(s) of information requested.  We will deal with your request to provide access to your health information within 45 days and you agree we may charge you our reasonable costs incurred in supplying you with access to this information.

Your rights to access personal or health information are not absolute and in certain circumstances, privacy laws dictate that we are not required to grant access.  If we do not provide access, we will let you know why. 

Updating your personal and health information

You may ask us to update or delete the health or personal information we hold about you (or a third party for whom you are responsible at the time of request, such as your child) at any time.  We will take reasonable steps to verify your identity before granting access or making any corrections to or deletion of your information.  We also have obligations to take reasonable steps to correct personal or health information we hold when we are satisfied that it is inaccurate, out of date, incomplete, irrelevant or misleading for the purpose for which it is held.

How to contact us or make a complaint

If you have any questions about the use and disclosure of your health and personal information, if you wish to update information we hold about you, or if you wish to make a complaint about our collection, use or disclosure of your health or personal information, please contact us by writing to us at Jarrah House, PO Box 6026, Malabar NSW 2036, by calling (02) 9661 6555, or by emailing [email protected].

We will take reasonable steps to remedy any issues resulting from our failure to comply with our privacy obligations within 45 days of receiving your complaint.