Intentional Breaches
Sometimes those who are now-in-the-know understand that the original owner will be horrified if they blab it about, yet they reveal the secret anyway. They may do so to actually hurt the original owner or simply because breaking the confidence works to their personal advantage. A painful romantic breakup is the classic case when the spurned partner lashes out by revealing intimate details that make the other look bad. Petronio didn’t run across disloyal breaches in her study of unofficial health advocates, but she did discover intentional boundary crossings when advocates faced a confidentiality dilemma . These occurred when patients said things to their doctor that advocates knew weren’t true or avoided revealing embarrassing medical information that advocates knew was important for the physician to know.
Petronio cites the example of a man who tells his cardiologist that he quit smoking after his heart surgery. His daughter who’s present is in a quandary.She could respect her father’s privacy but by her silence put his health at risk.
Or she could violate family privacy rules by revealing his continued smoking so that the doctor can make an informed medical decision. She faces a tragic moral choice where whatever she does is wrong.
Petronio found that advocates placed in this position opt for health over privacy, and speculates, “Perhaps in cases when safety or well-being is at stake, privacy issues seem less significant for those trying to help.” 24 In support of this interpretation, she notes that one man poignantly explained why he breached his wife’s privacy boundary —because Idid not want my wife to die.