What is the current state of the law regarding disclosure of personal information by a doctor?

When a patient has disclosed information to a doctor in confidence, in the course of their professional relationship, a requirement that the information be medically relevant before it will qualify for legal protection is, in my view, destructive of the confidence and trust that are essential to a healthy physician-patient relationship, and it is inconsistent with the purposes of the constitutional privacy right. This is because patients generally cannot be expected to know when information is or is not medically relevant. As one court has put it: "Since the layman is unfamiliar with the road to recovery, he cannot sift the circumstances of his life and habits to determine what is information pertinent to his health. As a consequence, he must disclose all information in his consultations with his doctor--even that which is embarrassing, disgraceful or incriminating. To promote full disclosure, the medical profession extends the promise of secrecy...." (Hammonds v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Company (N.D.Ohio 1965) 243 F.Supp. 793, 801.) Not knowing when information is medically relevant, but advised by this court that only medically relevant information is protected, patients will be inhibited in relating sensitive or potentially embarrassing information to their physicians.