Confidentiality of the Physician-Giraffe Relationship
From The Jefferson Muzzles, linked at a-life-online.
Soon after [the giraffe] Ryma's death, a Washington Post reporter sought access to the relevant medical records, including necropsy and pathology reports. To the reporter's amazement, an e-mail from National Zoo director Lucy Spelman flatly refused access to the records which had been requested. Even more startling were the reasons given for such a rebuff.
Releasing such records, Spelman declared, would violate the late giraffe's right of privacy. "The privacy rules that apply to human medical records, and to the physician-patient relationship," Spelman explained, "do not apply in precisely the same way to animal medicine at a public institution like the National Zoo. But we believe they do in principle." Lest there be any doubt about the rationale for withholding such materials, Spelman continued: "The core of veterinary medicine [as in human medicine] is the client-patient [keeper or curator-zoo animal] relationship," adding that "the medical record is essentially a written history of this relationship, but it is not written in a style or format geared toward the public."
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