Privacy Policy

We store and maintain patient records as part of our duty of care. This assists us and any other relevant practitioners to manage your needs and provide continuity of care.

We understand the importance of maintaining confidentiality in relation to the personal information that we collect. This Privacy Policy sets out how we comply with our obligations under the Privacy Act and other relevant State and Territory legislation.

By attending Polar Dental, you consent to your personal information being collected, used, disclosed, stored and otherwise handled in accordance with this Policy. We may change our Privacy Policy from time to time. Any revised Privacy Policy will apply both to information we already have about you at the time of the change, and any personal information or health information created or received after the change takes effect.  You should check our website periodically to ensure you are aware of our current Privacy Policy.

Personal information is information or an opinion about an identified or reasonably identifiable person, whether recorded in a material form or not. Personal information may also include information we collect about your individual preferences. It does not include information that is de-identified. Within this Privacy Policy unless indicated otherwise, references to personal information also include sensitive information such as information or an opinion about your health, or health services provided to you by the dental practitioners operating at Polar Dental.

We will only collect personal information from you where reasonably necessary for purposes directly related to your dental treatment. We will only collect as much personal information as we need to provide you with care and to allow us to obtain payment for our services. The types of personal information we may collect and hold about you include:

IDENTITY: Name, address, date of birth, gender/sex, occupation, email address, telephone number, details of next of kin, race

BILLING/ADMINISTRATION: Medicare number, DVA number, health insurance details, bank account information

MEDICAL: Medical history, clinical notes, test results, treatment plans, prescribed medications, referral details, clinical imaging

We may also collect personal information from you when you use and access our websites (including any information contained in an online enquiry or a request for an appointment, device type and ID, IP address, pages you visited, time and date of visit and geo-location information).

If you do not provide us with all the personal information we request, your dentist may be unable to provide you with certain services.

We collect personal information about you in several ways, including: 

• From you directly, (ie when you complete a new patient form) 
• From someone with responsibility for you (such as your parent, carer or guardian)
• From other medical practitioners, including those recorded in your patient records
• From external providers (such as your insurance or a referring dentist) which is provided to Polar Dental and included in your patient record
• From government agencies such as the Department of Veterans Affairs or Medicare that you may use for assistance to access our dental services
• From your use of our website

To provide informed care:

• To assist dental practitioners at Polar Dental to provide you with dental care, treatment and services;
• To provide you and/or another relevant practitioner with information that may assist you in managing and improving your oral health
• To establish a dental history that allows your dental practitioner to provide you with better care
• To identify changes to your oral health over time
• To respond to your online inquiries and/or process requests for appointments
• To send you appointment reminders (including by SMS or email) in relation to obtaining services from Polar Dental. This enables us to contact you to make follow-up appointments or to remind you that you, or a dependent, are due for a regular dental check-up. You have the option to opt out of this service on request.

To operate our business:

We use and handle your personal information as is reasonably incidental to our ordinary course operations, including where necessary to manage our administration, store data, conduct systems maintenance, and manage accounts and payment for the services provided to you. Subject to compliance with applicable Australian law, these incidental operations shall include our use and, where necessary, disclosure of your personal information.

For billing and collection purposes:

To obtain payment from you, Medicare, your private health insurance fund, or from any organisation responsible for payment of any part of your account, such as the Department of Veterans Affairs.

To provide you with information:

Including information regarding your oral health, as well as information about products and services offered by Polar Dental which might be of interest to you. You may opt-out of receiving such materials by following the unsubscribe process described in the relevant material.

To manage your information in a secure fashion:

For data entry and data analytics purposes, to enable an individual to discharge their duties as a member of our staff under Australian law; and to third parties where relevant to your treatment, subject to confidentiality and security conditions, to those who provide support or maintenance services for dental software, systems or equipment we use (including our practice management system, cloud storage systems and software and hardware within Polar Dental. We may use your personal information to provide third parties (such as government organisations) with aggregated, de-identified health information.

Should you, at any time, wish to withdraw your consent for your personal information to be part of a de-identified information database, please notify us. Withdrawing this consent will not affect the relationship between you and your dental practitioner, nor will it hinder your ability to access our services.

We may also access, use or disclose your personal information:

• If you provide written consent for your personal information to be accessed, used or disclosed to another practitioner
• To refer you to a relevant treating specialist
• To respond to a referring practitioner
• To respond to and manage a complaint or claim
• To prevent prohibited or illegal activities
• Where required to comply with any Australian law
• For the purposes of a permitted general situation or permitted health situation under the Privacy Act
• Where we reasonably believe it necessary to lessen or prevent a serious threat to the life, health or safety of an individual or public health or safety

We may hold your personal information in either electronic or hard copy form. We take reasonable steps, and implement reasonable safeguards, to protect your personal information that we hold from misuse, interference and loss, as well as unauthorised access, modification and disclosure. We ensure that all staff handle patient information securely, in accordance with this Privacy Policy and in compliance with professional duties of confidentiality.

We are subject to, and adhere to, a range of obligations relating to the periods for which health information and records must be retained.

You (or your parent, guardian, attorney or authorised representative) may request details of what personal information we hold about you and access to, or that corrections be made to, the personal information we hold about you.

If you do so, please specify your identity and the details and format of the information which you are seeking access to, or correction of (including the element of inaccuracy or incompleteness, and information required to correct your information)

There are some circumstances where we are not required to give you access to or correct your personal information. We will normally give you a written notice setting out our reasons for not complying with your request and informing you of how you can complain about our refusal.

There is no fee for requesting access to your personal information or for us to make corrections to the same. However, we may charge a reasonable fee for our costs involved in collating and providing you with access to any personal information, in accordance with applicable law. That fee is payable before access is given.

The Privacy Act requires us to notify affected individuals and the Australian Information Commissioner about ‘eligible data breaches’. An eligible data breach occurs when the following criteria are met:

• There is unauthorised access to or disclosure of personal information we hold (or information is lost in circumstances where unauthorised access or disclosure is likely to occur)
• The data breach is likely to result in serious harm to any of the individuals to whom the information relates
• We are unable to prevent the likely risk of serious harm with remedial action

If it is not clear whether a suspected data breach meets these criteria, we will investigate and assess the breach to determine whether the breach is an ‘eligible data breach’ that requires us to notify the affected individuals.  This is to ensure that you are notified if your personal information is involved in a data breach that is likely to result in serious harm.  Even if the criteria are not met, we may decide it appropriate to notify you anyway.