Providing health care services should be as follows:

• In accordance with human dignity and with respect for the values and cultural and religious beliefs
• Based on honesty, fairness, courtesy and kindness
• Without any discrimination, including ethnic, cultural, religious, and gender as well as any discrimination based on the type of the disease
• Based on the latest knowledge
• Based on the superiority of patient interests
• Based on distribution of health resources with respect to patient safety, fairness and patients' treatment preferences
• Based on coordination of health care components including prevention, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation
• Based on offering all the basic and required facilities and without suffering any pain and imposing unnecessary limitations
• Based on special attention to the rights of vulnerable groups such as children, pregnant women, the elderly, mentally ill people, prisoners, physically and mentally disabled people and children having no parents
• As fast as possible and with respect to patient time
• Based on considering variables such as language, age and gender of service recipients.
• Performed immediately and with no delay in emergency condition, without respect to the cost of it. In non-emergency (elective) cases, services should be offered based on the defined rules.
• In emergency cases, if the proper services are not possible, patient should be transferred to an equipped section after receiving necessary services.
• In the condition that the patient death is imminent, the services should be provided with respect to keeping patient’s convenience and calmness. By alleviating patient’s pain we mean giving attention to psychological, social, spiritual and emotional needs of the patient and his family. It is the right of the patient to be with the person he wants at the last moment of his life.                              

Principle 2: Patient should be provided with adequate and proper information.

The content of the information should include:

• · Patient rights legislation at the time of admission
• · Terms and predictable costs such as medical and non-medical services and conditions of insurance and the introduction of support systems at the time of admission
• · Name, position and professional rank of medical staff responsible for providing care including physicians, nurses and their professional relationship with each other
• · Diagnostic and therapeutic methods and strengths and weaknesses points of each method and its possible complications, diagnosis, prognosis and complications and also all the effective information in patient's decision-making process
• · How to access to the attending physician and the main members of the medical group during treatment
• · All the research-based measures
• · Providing essential training to continue treatment

 

The way information is provided should be as follows:

• · Information should be provided to the patient timely and it should be in accordance with patient's condition, including anxiety and pain and his personal characteristics such as language, education, and perception ability, except for the following situations:
• · Delay in treatment may result in harm to the patient due to receiving the mentioned information (In this case, giving necessary information to the patients should be after performing required measures and at the right time.
• · Patient avoids receiving information which in this case, patient’s demand should be respected unless the patient and others be at risk.
• · Patient can have access to all the information recorded in his clinical records, have a copy of it and ask for the correction of the existing errors.
• · All information patients can access their clinical records and the image it receives a request to correct errors contained therein.

 

Principle 3: The patient should be allowed to choose and freely make decision about receiving health care services.

Scope of choosing and decision making are as follows:

· Choosing the attending physician and health care services provider in a regularity framework

· Choosing another doctor as a medical consultant

· Participation or non-participation in any research and being sure that his decision will have no effect on the continuity of receiving health care services.

· Accepting or rejecting the proposed treatment after having informed of the possible problems of accepting or rejecting it except in case of suicide or in the cases that rejecting the treatment put another person in danger.

· When patient is qualified for making decision, he should give comments about his future treatment measure so that they can be used as a guide for medical measures at the time the patient is not in a good condition for making decision. All the measures will be performed according to legal regulations considered by health care services providers.

Terms of choosing and decision making are as follows:

· The patient should be allowed to choose and make decision freely and consciously and also based on adequate information

· Having provided with necessary information, patient should have sufficient time to make decision and choose how to receive his health care services.

Principle 4: Providing health care services must be based on respect to patient privacy (right to privacy) and the principle of confidentiality.

· Observing the principle of confidentiality about all patient-related information is required except in cases where the law has exceptions.

· In all steps of patient care including diagnosis and treatment, patient’s privacy must be respected. It is essential that all the necessary measures be performed to ensure the privacy of the patient.

· Only the patient, medical team and those authorized by the patient as well as those allowed by law can have access to the patient’s information.

· The patient has the right to have a trusted companion with himself during diagnostic procedures such as examinations. It is the right of a child to be with one of his parents during treatment procedures, unless it is against medical necessities.

Principle 5: It is the right of the patient to have access to complaints system.

· Every patient has the right to claim for violation of their rights under this charter and complain to competent authorities without being worried about any impairment of the quality of health care services. 

· Patients have the right to be informed of how their complaints are handled.

· Damage caused by the errors of health care services providers should be compensated according to the provisions of law in the shortest possible time.