The management of confidentiality in Egypt

Patient confidentiality is an important issue for treating clinician regardless of the cultural background. Though cultural and religious issues may have an impact on the confidentiality standards. This article discusses the confidentiality standards in Egypt citing the laws and ethical codes governing them. This is followed by a research study in which a questionnaire containing ten vignettes representing different common themes confronted by the practicing clinician was completed by forty-one Egyptian psychiatrists. They checked off categories representing alternatives they might choose dealing with the themes. Each respondent received a score. The scores were compared with those of American and Israeli psychiatrists who participated in a similar study. There were no statistically significant differences though Egyptian and Israeli psychiatrists appear to be somewhat more inclined to break confidentiality. However, significant differences were found to exist for some of the vignettes between the three groups.