Medical records of a lot of patients at the St Joseph’s district hospital in Ballina were found in the bin at a local housing estate.

Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) Billy Hawkes warned the medical authorities to stand by their legal responsibilities and should protect the security of a patient’s information.

The DPC has been investigating 14 cases of unauthorized disclosure of medical records since July 1.

The medical notes carrying the information of the patients were discarded in an inappropriate manner. These notes were found by the litter warden and were returned to the hospital authorities.

According to the Health Service Executive (HSE), these notes found in the bin had the list of the patients who visit the hospital and also, some of these notes were written by staff members to help in the process of the handover of shifts.

“On the rare occasions where the HSE finds that patient records have been inappropriately disposed of or stolen, the HSE has a policy of treating such events as serious incidents", HSE said.

However, the hospital follows some policies in disposing such kinds of material but this incident indicated that such policies were not followed and the hospital has now been investigating how and why did it happen.