Ontario’s privacy watchdog has ordered the province to publish the names of the 100 doctors whose billings to the Ontario Health Insurance Plan are highest.
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TIL: Personal email, BBMs subject to FOI, watchdog tells public servants
Ontario’s information and privacy commissioner is telling government and public sector staff that their personal email and BlackBerry Messenger accounts are subject to freedom of information requests.
Sudbury column: Time to act on poverty reduction
So how are we doing? We have had three poverty reduction plans released by the provincial Liberals and I am still waiting for them to actually reduce poverty.
http://www.thesudburystar.com/
What Would a Trauma-Informed Society Look Like?
The rapidly increased rates of diagnosable mental illness may have been partially driven by greed, corporate interests, prestige, and consequences of drugging the masses with toxic chemicals known to cause many of the problems they purport to assist. Many authors, such as Robert Whitaker, have certainly made cases for all of these factors. Yet, greed and corporate tyranny can only exist when there is demand.
https://www.madinamerica.com/
Life in the shadows of the concussion debate
I’m in the kitchen pouring rice into a cup when my husband asks a question. I look towards him but my brain can’t do two things at once. The rice hits the floor. Thousands of grains scatter under the counter, the oven, the fridge. I grab a broom but can’t focus. My neurons are in overdrive: dinner is late, I have to get downtown but I can’t drive that far and the 45-minute streetcar ride seems daunting.
https://www.thestar.com/news/
MARFO v AHMED, 2016 ONSC 3696 (CanLII)
[1] This motion is brought by the defendants pursuant to section 105 of Courts of Justice Act, RSO 1990, c C.43 and Rule 33 of theRules of Civil Procedure, RRO 1990, Reg. 194. The defendants seek an order requiring the plaintiff to attend a defence orthopedic examination with Dr. Terry Axelrod. The plaintiff is opposed.
[11] The defendants argued that in the summer of 2015 they received information regarding a subsequent motor vehicle accident involving the plaintiff that took place in September 2011. The defendants submitted that this new information formed a basis for a second physical examination of the plaintiff by the defendants’ proposed orthopedic expert. I do not agree. Dr. Berbrayer was aware of this second accident when he prepared his addendum report and nevertheless concluded that his original opinion remained unaltered. Dr. Berbrayer did not state that he required a further physical examination of the plaintiff in view of this new information. The defendants have not filed any evidence on this motion from any other physician indicating a second physical examination is necessary. The only evidence filed by the defendants is from a law clerk employed in the office of the defendants’ lawyers.
Schaefer v Ayeneababa, 2016 ONSC 3673 (CanLII)
[7] The plaintiff’s uncontroverted evidence (supported by the pertinent medical documentation) is that she “always understood that with time and proper treatment my injuries would resolve and I would be able to return to my pre-accident activities.” As she put it in her affidavit:
At no time was I told that my injuries and impairments were permanent and would not get better with time and treatment. By August 20, 2010 [just over a year after the accident] I continued to have pain and impairments and therefore retained [my lawyer] … to represent me with respect to the injuries I had sustained in the motor vehicle accident. I relied on [my lawyer] to take whatever steps were necessary to proceed with my claims …
Ontario (Health and Long-Term Care) (Re), 2016 CanLII 32641 (ON IPC)
Summary: The record at issue in this appeal, created in response to a request by a journalist, sets out the total dollar amounts paid annually to the top 100 OHIP billers, their names and their medical specialties, for the years 2008-2012. The ministry disclosed the dollar amounts and most of the specialties, but withheld the physicians’ names and some of the specialties under the personal privacy exemption at section 21(1) of the Act. One of the parties to the appeal also raised the third party information exemption at section 17(1) of the Act. The appellant claims that the public interest override in section 23 applies. In this order, the adjudicator finds that: (1) the record does not contain personal information, and as a consequence, section 21(1) does not apply; (2) section 17(1) also does not apply; and (3) there is a compelling public interest in the disclosure of the record that would clearly outweigh the purposes of these exemptions if they applied. The ministry is ordered to disclose the record in its entirety to the appellant.