Hold on, just a second here.  Confidentiality refers to patients'
confidentiality, not the hospitals.  What goes on in hospital
(procedures, policies) should be an open book.  As long as there is no
way to identify the patient involved, there is no concern about
confidentiality.

Even if you give details such as: age of mother, date of birth of
baby, number of children, which drugs the baby is on, only those who
have access to the patient records could find out who that person is.
And even then, they would have to search.

Lawyers or anyone can listen in on email, but there are also all sorts
of people who come to grand rounds too.  When I give lectures at grand
rounds frequently many people from the community come.  They could be
anyone.  Yet I use case reports all the time.  This is in no way
breeching the patients' confidentiality.  Using the mother or baby's
name, on the other hand, even if it were impossible to identify where
they were born would be a breech of confidentiality.  Since this list
is for health professionals only, it is, in many ways, much like
rounds, or a medical journal.  Case reports are used all the time in
medical journals, and lawyers have access to these journals in
libraries or on the internet.

It sounds as if your hospital *is* trying to stifle discussion.  Isn't
that unconstitutional in the US?  If they fire you, it would be a
blatant case of wrongful dismissal (I'm not a lawyer).

Jack Newman, MD, FRCPC