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U.S. National Center for Health Statistics Staff Manual on Confidentiality

At-a-glance
Application Level Registry Users Customers Users
Principles
Practical Applications		 Basic Management
Research/Surveillance
Steward		 Public Health Professional
Link: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/misc/staffmanual2004.pdf

Overview:
This document was most recently updated in 2004. The National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) provides for the release of the birth and death certificate data for the United States and this document describes policies to protect these data from improper disclosure. This 22 page article provides some information that is unique to NCHS, but also has sections on avoiding disclosure through the release of microdata (files) and published tabular data. It describes the roles of a Confidentiality Officer, supervisor, and employee in protecting data confidentiality. If a registry is new to data release, this document would provide a good introduction to some of the issues that need to be considered.