To be able to provide you with good care, the professionals treating you must have access to all necessary information about your state of health and the examinations that have been performed on you. Allowing your patient information to be shared between health care service providers makes it easier and quicker to provide you with the appropriate care.
Once you have given your consent to data sharing, your data may be shared from Kanta, for example,
- between public and private health care service providers
- between wellbeing services counties.
If you do not give your consent to data sharing, your data can only be used in the wellbeing services county or private healthcare organisation where your data was originally recorded.
Your data may only be accessed and used if it is necessary for your care. In addition, your data may only be accessed by professionals with whom you have a current treatment relationship.
Consent to data sharing is given separately for healthcare patient data and social welfare client data. Giving your consent to data sharing is always voluntary.
Example: During a holiday trip, you need to use healthcare services in another wellbeing services county. If you have given consent to data sharing, the attending physician may, if required, utilise your patient data that were recorded in your wellbeing services county, for example, at your local healthcare centre. This will ensure that your physician has access to comprehensive information about you.
Until now, consent to data sharing enabled the information in Kanta to be shared between the different parties providing your care. In the future, consent to data sharing will also enable the sharing of data that is not in Kanta. This includes, for example, information about you that is recorded on paper.
If you have given your consent to data sharing 2023 or earlier, we recommend that you update it in MyKanta. In this way, your consent to data sharing will enable the sharing of data that is not in Kanta.
If you update your consent to data sharing, healthcare service providers may disclose your data that our not stored in the Kanta Services once the healthcare organisation in question has made the necessary changes to its information systems. The upgrade of the systems is progressing at different times in different organisations.
If you do not update your consent to data sharing, your previous consent will remain in force and enable the sharing of your data stored in Kanta.
If you give consent for the first time, it enables the sharing of both your data in Kanta and your other data. In this case, you don’t need to update your consent.
Where can I give or update my consent to data sharing?
You can give or update your consent to data sharing once you have received the information about Kanta Services.
You can give or update your consent to data sharing
- in MyKanta
- when visiting a health care facility.
If a health care facility notes that you have not given your consent to data sharing, health care professionals may ask you while providing treatment whether you would like to give your consent to data sharing. You may also be asked if the consent you previously gave may be updated. Once given, your consent to data sharing will remain valid until further notice. It will apply to data recorded before you gave consent as well as to any data recorded thereafter.
You can check in MyKanta when and where you gave your consent to data sharing.
See instructions for updating the consent to data sharing.
Withdrawing and restricting consent to data sharing
You may withdraw your consent to data sharing at any time. You may do this in MyKanta or when visiting a health care facility.
If you withdraw your consent, your data will no longer be shared with other service providers.
Instead of either general denial or general consent, you may restrict your consent to data sharing by issuing specific denials of consent. With these denials, you can specify which particular patient information you do not want to be available to other service providers.
Read more about issuing denials.
When is consent to data sharing not necessary?
There are cases where no consent is necessary for using or sharing your patient information; some examples are given below.
A health care service provider – for example, a wellbeing services county – has access to your patient data entered in various units of its organisation. This data may be accessed and used through their patient information system. However, in order for them to be allowed to do so, you must have a current treatment relationship with that service provider. In this case, the data are being used within the service provider’s own patient register, so using the data does not constitute data sharing. This use does not require your consent.
Your consent to data sharing is not required if your patient information is used in public health care in the region of Uusimaa. This use is allowed if you have received information about Kanta Services.
In an emergency, your patient information may be accessed via Kanta without your specific consent. However, when issuing denials of consent to data sharing, you can determine specifically whether your restricted patient information may be accessed in case of an emergency, or not even then.
Consent to data sharing is not required in situations where a person is unable to give such consent due to a memory disorder or learning disability.
If you are receiving care as an outsourced service, the service provider providing the care has the right to access any patient information that is relevant for the care being given to you. This use does not require your consent.
Consent to data sharing, minors
You can give consent to data sharing on behalf of a minor, or update your child’s consent to data sharing in the section for acting on behalf of another person in MyKanta or when visiting health care services. You may withdraw child’s consent to data sharing at a health care service point.
Please note that if the minor in question has already been assessed by health care professionals as being capable of making their own decisions about access to their data, and has been informed about Kanta Services, you as their parent/guardian are not allowed to give or withdraw consent to data sharing on their behalf in MyKanta.
If a health care professional decides that a minor is mature enough to decide on access to their data themselves, the minor may give or update consent to data sharing for their patient information. However, such a minor cannot give or update consent to data sharing in MyKanta; this must be done when visiting health care services.
Consent to data sharing, acting on behalf of an adult
You may act on behalf of another adult in MyKanta if you have a Suomi.fi authorisation for this purpose. If you are authorised in this way, you can give or update consent to data sharing or issue a denial of consent to data sharing in MyKanta or when you visit a social welfare or health care facility. Of course, the person authorising you can also give consent to data sharing or deny such consent.
The consent and denials of consent to data sharing are valid until further notice and can be withdrawn at any time.