NHS patients are slammed after secretly recording medical procedures for TikTok

Patients across the UK are being criticised for secretly recording their NHS medical treatments on mobile phones – often without staff permission – and uploading the footage to TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook.

From cryptic ‘hospital selfie’ posts to IV drip boomerangs, is it really about health – or just a hunt for online validation?

The Society of Radiographers warned that this growing trend puts NHS staff under stress, breaches other patients’ privacy and turns clinical environments into content farm. The Society of Radiographers (SoR) is calling for national guidelines that ban covert filming within hospitals.

As quoted by The, Dean Rogers is the director of strategy at SoR. Daily Mail.

The union warned that distracted or uncomfortable staff may struggle to deliver high-quality care – and unfiltered videos might expose sensitive medical details of people in the same room. Some staff members have been surprised to discover that they had been secretly filmed, and their personal details and ID badges were shared online.

Ashley d’Aquino said she was approached by her colleagues in London after patients filmed treatments without their consent.

At the SoR’s Annual Delegates’ Conference she shared:

I had a patient whose relative began filming as I was setting up the treatment. It wasn’t the right time – I was trying to focus on delivering the treatment” (Cited by the BBC).

She said that once a colleague agreed to take photos for a cancer patient, but the patient secretly recorded her and planned to post it on her blog.

In a second case, an assistant in the department said that she was inserting cannulas when the 19-year old daughter of the patient began filming without asking.

NHS urges standardisation of no-filming policies

The SoR states that while some trusts have already banned unauthorised filming of staff, all NHS trusts need to adopt clear, consistent rules in order to protect the privacy and wellbeing of their patients, as well as their staff.

Prof Meghana Paandit, NHS England’s co-national Medical Director, has stressed that filming without permission is unacceptable.

“Recording other patients inadvertently and without their permission risks breaching patient confidentiality… It should never be posted to social media,” she told the BBC.

What is the limit? Will the same be true for photos and videos taken in hospitals? Will footage of the ringing bell at the end of celebrations in cancer wards for children be banned? Please let us know in the comments what you think.

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