Lawsuits against doctors and hospitals due to medical confidentiality breaches are not new in European states, as the oldest of such cases count over a hundred years. Far more similar cases are resolved by Ukrainian courts over the last few years, which indicates a high level of topicality in a dynamic development of Ukrainian medical law. A prominent example of it is the adjudication of a number of medical law cases by the Supreme Court of Ukraine, where plaintiffs demanded to recover damages because of a breach of medical confidentiality, or strived to obtain insight to their medical records.

 The aim of the article is to conduct a review of the topical cassational practice of the Supreme Court of Ukraine in cases relating to data protection in healthcare. The medical information is considered as ‘sensitive’ personal data, the disclosure of which may bring to deplorable consequences to the plaintiff, which may considerably affect on his employment, working and professional activity, as well as personal life. Apart from this, the author pays attention on the explanation of what information the Supreme Court of Ukraine considers to be encompassed by the term ‘medical secrecy’ in its cassational practice, since the said notion requires a thorough categorization. The 21st century technologies enable the identification of the patient upon biological samples, and so, the concept of personal data may not be merely regarded as information, which is recorded entirely on paper or electronic carriers.

The following methods of scientific research are used by the author in the given paper: the historical-legal in terms of researching the roots of ‘medical confidentiality’ and the first attempts of the courts to determine what information should be regarded in the scope of medical confidentiality, the hermeneutical one for the necessity of the description of topical practice of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, and the comparative one for the needs of comparing the national and foreign jurisprudence.

Bibliography

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Conference papers

25. Lytvynenko A, ‘Senate Rules that Transfer of an In-patient’s Health Data without his Consent to the State Police Violates Medical Confidentiality: Judgment SKA 41/2020’ v XI International Scientific Conference “Time of challenges and opportunities: problems, solutions and prospects” (2021 Riga) 139–46 (in English).