For ease of reading and editorial simplification, the masculine form is used throughout this text. However, the authors ask readers to associate the feminine form with the entire document.
Swiss Medical Network Hospitals SA (SMNH), as well as the healthcare providers that make up the Rete Sant'Anna, attach great importance to data protection. For this reason, we would like to inform you about which of your data we collect and how we use it.
Data protection is the responsibility of SMNH's senior management.
Your data is processed (collected, recorded, used and stored) on the basis of the medical treatment contract and legal provisions, in order to achieve the objectives of the medical treatment and fulfil the related obligations. The data is collected by SMNH as part of your registration. With your consent, we also receive data from other doctors and healthcare facilities that are or have been involved in your current or past treatment. Only data relating to your treatment is processed in your medical file. This includes personal information about your life situation, contact and insurance details, as well as, among other things, information from consultations relating to medical treatment or health data collected, such as medical history, diagnoses, treatments, diagnostic, therapeutic or care measures and results.
We process and store your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil our contractual and legal obligations. Your medical file will be kept for 20 years after the last treatment. After this period, it will be archived, deleted or destroyed in a secure manner. If the data is no longer required for current treatment (but cannot yet be deleted for health or liability reasons), it will be archived and no longer actively processed in the system. We are obliged to retain all patient documentation. As patients, you cannot decide which documents should be retained in our systems and which should be deleted. Video surveillance recordings are automatically deleted within a maximum of 7 working days. Longer storage is only possible in the event of a claim.
We only transfer your personal data, in particular medical data, between the various SMNH facilities and the hospitals and healthcare providers that make up the Rete Sant'Anna, as well as to external service providers, if this is permitted or required by law, or if you have given your consent to the transfer of such data in accordance with this form and/or in another manner in the context of your treatment. With your consent, you confirm the following
In accordance with the specific requirements of the legal regulations in force, the following rules apply:
You may withdraw your explicit consent to the processing of your data at any time. The withdrawal or request to change your consent must be made in writing. Once we have received your written withdrawal, and if your data can no longer be processed on a legal basis other than consent, the processing of your data will be discontinued. The withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of the data processing carried out until the withdrawal.
As data subjects, you have the right to access and consult, rectify, delete (not patient data, which must be retained for public interest purposes) and restrict the processing of your personal data. The originals of the medical records always remain at SMNH. The storage and delivery of patient documentation for hospital treatment is governed by health regulations. Hospitals performing public functions must offer patient documentation to the relevant archive after the retention period has expired. Delivery to the patient is only possible if the archive does not accept the documentation. This rule gives greater weight to the public interest in archiving than to the private interest of patients in the delivery or destruction of documentation. Therefore, patients cannot claim the documentation during the retention period, as this would prevent its transfer to the relevant archive. They are only entitled to copies (or printouts for electronic documentation).
We take organisational, contractual and technical security measures to ensure compliance with data protection legislation and to protect the data we process against accidental or intentional manipulation, loss, destruction or access by unauthorised persons. All your data is stored securely on servers in Switzerland or physically at SMNH or at the hospitals and outpatient clinics that make up the Rete Sant'Anna network. If data is transferred abroad (e.g. digital dictation software), this is done to countries that comply with data protection regulations.
To exercise your rights or if you have any questions or suggestions regarding data protection, please contact the Rete Sant'Anna quality department.
