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To the Editor.—The study by Dr Ford and colleagues¹ showed that adolescents are sensitive to assurances of medical confidentiality, and that their concerns influence their stated intentions of discussing sensitive issues with their physicians and of considering return visits for even routine medical care. Adolescents who received assurances of some sort responded that they would be more likely both to share sensitive information and to seek medical treatment in the future than those given no assurance. This is an interesting and satisfying experimental finding, but physicians should resist the impulse to apply it directly to practice.

Unconditional guarantees of confidentiality are simply false. Even the conditional guarantee scripted for the study may be difficult for physicians to honor. The authors apparently recognize the compromised state of medical confidentiality today in their statement that further investigations are needed to devise "a confidentiality assurance that explains the legal and ethical limitations . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT