Rights of a minor

Rights of a minor

Children have the right to participate in decision-making concerning the management of their affairs in accordance with their level of development. Procedures differ slightly in social welfare and health care.

Minors can use MyKanta themselves if they have electronic identification tools, such as online banking IDs or a mobile certificate. You can learn more about using MyKanta on the MyKanta for young People page.

From this page, you can find information about the rights of minors related to the use of Kanta services in social welfare and health care.

Rights regarding prescriptions

A health care professional assesses whether a minor is able to make decisions about their treatment. The assessment of decision-making capacity is recorded on each prescription. If a health care professional considers a minor to be able to make decisions about their treatment, the minor has the same rights as adults.

They can:

  • ​​​​​request a prescription renewal and provide their phone number for notifications by text message
  • receive a summary of their prescriptions
  • set up and cancel a denial of consent on a prescription
  • set and cancel denials of consent to sharing their data to their guardian or other legal representative.

Rights regarding patient data

The patient data recorded for a child under the age of 10 is usually visible to the child’s guardian in MyKanta. The visibility of information about a child over 10 years of age varies, because this requires modifications to health care information systems. The visibility of the information to the guardian requires that the child’s decision-making capacity be assessed and recorded in the minor’s data.

The decision on whether a minor's medical records are visible to their guardian is made separately at the health care unit at each visit. The assessment of a minor's capacity to make decisions by a professional is influenced, among other things, by

  • the child's age
  • their level of maturity
  • their care plan
  • the reason for the appointment.

A minor with decision-making capacity can also decide whether or not their data will be visible to their guardian. A minor cannot, however, deny a parent or guardian access to all information.

During a visit to a health care unit, a minor who is assessed as having decision-making capacity can also decide on the use of their data by, for example, consenting to the sharing of their data or setting up a denial of consent.

As a rule, a guardian can view all client information recorded about a child under the age of 18 in MyKanta. However, if necessary, the social welfare professional who records the data will assess whether the information will be shown to the guardian.

When using social services, a minor may request that their client data is not shown to their guardian in MyKanta. Based on the minor’s level of development and the nature of the case, the professional will assess whether there are grounds for the prohibition requested by the minor. If the prohibition is contrary to the best interests of the minor, the professional may refuse it.

The professional records the reasons for the denial of consent or the refusal to comply with the request in the customer’s information. In addition, the professional must assess the appropriateness of disclosing the information to the guardian, even if the minor does not themselves deny their consent to sharing the data.
 
A minor who, in the opinion of a professional, is capable of deciding to share their data may, when using social services, give or withdraw consent to sharing their data. If a minor does not have the capacity to decide on matters related to the use of their own data, their guardian may make decisions on their behalf.

Minors can

  • collect prescription drugs from a pharmacy
  • obtain a summary of their prescriptions
  • request an overview of their medication
  • request a prescription renewal and provide their phone number for notifications by text message
  • collect medicines on someone else’s behalf
  • collect medicines from a foreign pharmacy

A minor can use MyKanta to

  • view their prescriptions and health information
  • view their social services client data, which will be added to MyKanta in stages in the future
  • view and download a COVID-19 certificate
  • store and view their wellbeing data
  • print out a summary of their prescriptions
  • renew prescriptions.

A minor cannot use MyKanta to

​​​​​​When a minor reaches the age of 18, they gain access to all the information about them stored in Kanta.

Minor as a guardian

If a person under the age of 18 has custody of a child, they have the same rights to manage the affairs of the minor child as an adult guardian.

Last updated 30.4.2024