Kitano Medical Research Institute, Public Interest Incorporated Foundation, Tatsunokofukai
Hospital Director Daisuke Hata

We are pleased to announce that a Compact Flash card (CF card), the recording medium for an electrocardiogram, was lost at the Kitano Hospital, Medical Research Institute, a public interest incorporated foundation run by the Tatsuno Kofukai Foundation (hereinafter referred to as "our hospital"). We would like to report the details of the incident below and sincerely apologize to all involved parties for any inconvenience caused.

Although no personal information has been leaked at this time, we take this incident very seriously and will strive to prevent a recurrence in the future. We would appreciate your continued guidance and support.

As it is difficult to identify the patients who have been directly affected as described below, this notice will serve as a notice to the individuals concerned as required by the Personal Information Protection Act.

1. Overview

At our hospital, we sometimes perform electrocardiogram tests at the bedside of hospitalized patients. The equipment used for this is wirelessly connected to the intranet, and the electrocardiogram data is sent to the filing system along with the patient's medical card number. In addition, to prevent the loss of information in the event of a network malfunction, the testing equipment is equipped with a CF card for data storage. In the event of a network malfunction, the CF card is transported to the physiological testing department and the data is retrieved. Recently, on November 8th, when an employee attempted to use the equipment, they discovered that the CF card was not installed. They immediately searched various parts of the hospital, but have not yet found it.

In accordance with the Personal Information Protection Act, our hospital filed a notification with the relevant administrative authority on November 21st.

2. Lost Information

The data stored on the CF card is basically the patient's electrocardiogram waveform data and patient card number. Because the lost CF card has not been found, it is not possible to identify the relevant test or patient, but based on the card's capacity, it is estimated that it contains data for up to approximately 3,000 tests. Furthermore, an investigation of other similar devices within the hospital has indicated that, due to operational reasons, a small amount of data may contain patients' names in kana. Please note that special equipment and software are required to read data from the CF card in question.

3. Measures to prevent recurrence

In order to handle CF cards more carefully than ever before, we have sealed the CF card slot so that it cannot be removed normally. Furthermore, we have changed the operation so that only a limited number of personnel are allowed to handle CF cards, and the data on the card is checked and erased during annual inspections. In addition, we have updated network connection devices and changed the settings to prevent network malfunctions.