Family emails and AI confidentiality: what an update after a fall gives away in ChatGPT or Claude.

Writing to a resident’s family is the hardest writing in aged care, because it has to be accurate, kind and careful all at once. That is why staff ask ChatGPT or Claude to help with it. The email carries the resident’s health information, the family’s own circumstances, and whatever difficult thing the service needs to say. This page marks every item in an email to a daughter after her mother’s fall that the Aged Care Act 2024 and the Privacy Act protect, and shows how the same email is drafted on Ermos inside the service.

The email to a resident’s family

Sent by the registered nurse or facility manager to the substitute decision-maker after an incident, a change in condition or a care review.

To:
From:
Subject: Your mum, this morning

Dear Carolyn,

I wanted to write as well as call, so you have everything in one place.

With kind regards,

An invented email. Hover or tap any highlighted item for the analysis; the full list is below.

What leaves the service

  1. 1
    The daughter

    A named family member and guardian. Her personal information, and the relationship that identifies the resident. Privacy Act guide.

  2. 2
    The fall and the injury

    Health information about the resident, including a previous fracture. Sensitive information under the Privacy Act and protected under section 168 of the Act. Patient data guide.

  3. 3
    Medication, hospital and results

    A blood thinner, a named hospital, a scan and an X-ray result. Health information from two providers, in one paragraph. Patient data guide.

  4. 4
    Behaviour, a psychotropic and a consent conversation

    That the resident has struck staff, that her risperidone is under review, and that her guardian’s consent is needed. Restrictive practice decisions under the Act, in draft. Patient data guide.

  5. 5
    A pressure injury

    A wound that has not healed. Clinical information, and a quality indicator the provider reports on. Patient data guide.

  6. 6
    A family dispute

    That the resident’s son is being refused information at his sister’s request. A confidence about the family, and about the provider’s handling of it. Privacy Act guide.

  7. 7
    Contact details and a review

    The nurse’s number and a plan for a care review. Operational, and identifying.

  8. 8
    The nurse

    Ties the email to a named worker bound by the Aged Care Code of Conduct.

What happens in Frontier Models (ChatGPT, Claude)

  • The whole document is transmitted to the provider’s servers. On personal plans the user cannot choose where it is stored or processed, and for the major providers that has generally meant outside Australia, under that country’s legal process. Some business plans offer storage in Australia, but the provider still receives the content.
  • On consumer tiers, prompts can be retained and used to train future models.
  • The provider’s staff and systems can reach the content under the provider’s own policies.
  • Once sent, the service no longer controls it. Retention and deletion happen on the provider’s terms.

The same document on Ermos

Ermos Dominion

The document is drafted on a unit in your office, from your own templates and the resident’s record. Every marked item stays on the unit, which keeps working with the internet switched off. Nothing in it is transmitted to an AI provider, so there is no disclosure to analyse: the confidentiality work is the same as for your file server.

Ermos Edge

Your documents, the index and your access boundaries stay on your own instance in an Australian data centre. When a staff member asks for this draft, only their question and the excerpts they are permitted to see go to a named Australian provider, who is contractually barred from keeping the content or training any model on it. Nothing is processed outside Australia.

Frontier Models (ChatGPT, Claude)Ermos EdgeErmos Dominion
Where the document is processedProvider servers, generally offshore on personal plansYour instance in an Australian data centre; answers generated in AustraliaThe unit in your office
Who can read itProvider staff and systems, under policyYour staff, within the boundaries you set. The named Australian provider processes only permitted excerpts, under contract, and keeps nothingYour staff only
Is it keptOn the provider’s termsKept on your instance; the provider is barred from retaining itStays on the unit
Can it train a modelOn consumer tiers, yesNo, by contractOnly your own unit learns from it, on your hardware

Part of AI data leakage in aged care providers.

Common questions

Do ChatGPT and Claude use the information in an email to a resident's family?
Yes, a pasted email is sent to the AI company and processed there to produce the reply. As at October 2026, whether a conversation on a personal plan (ChatGPT Free, Plus or Pro; Claude Free, Pro or Max) can be used to train the models depends on a setting each user controls. Business plans (ChatGPT Business and Enterprise, Claude Team and Enterprise) and the developer APIs sit under commercial terms, and OpenAI and Anthropic each say they do not train on that content by default (OpenAI, Anthropic). On either product, the thumbs up and thumbs down buttons can send a whole conversation back for training. This email carries a fall and its injury, the hospital results and a son being refused updates.
Is it safe to paste an email to a resident's family into ChatGPT or Claude?
No, because the email describes one named resident and was written for one reader, the guardian. The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) recommends in its guidance on commercially available AI products that organisations do not enter personal information, and particularly sensitive information, into publicly available generative AI tools, because of the significant and complex privacy risks. The head injury, the blood thinner, the hospital scan and the risperidone review are health information about the resident. A son's refused access is a family confidence. Removing the names would leave both in place, and pasting the draft discloses them to a company with no role in the resident's care.
Does a ChatGPT Business or Claude Team plan make it safe to use for an email to a resident's family?
Only in part. A business plan changes the default on training, but it does not change who receives the content. On a personal plan the user cannot choose where conversations are stored or processed. Some business plans let an organisation choose to store data at rest in Australia (OpenAI), which still leaves the content with the AI company. The OAIC's guidance also tells organisations to review carefully the terms and settings that will apply to their use of any AI product. For this email, the AI company would still receive the guardian's name, the fall, the hospital results and the review of the risperidone dose. Our comparisons with ChatGPT Enterprise and Claude weigh the trade-offs.
How can an aged care service use AI for an email to a resident's family without sending it to ChatGPT or Claude?
Ermos is built so the document stays under your control. On the Dominion AI unit it is drafted inside your office and none of it is sent to an AI provider. On Ermos Edge your documents and index stay on your own instance in an Australian data centre, and only the question and the excerpts the user is permitted to see go to a named Australian provider that is contractually barred from keeping them or training any model on them. The nurse asks for a draft, written from the incident entry, the care plan and the progress notes in the service's usual tone and template. The nurse edits it and signs it off before it is sent.
The daughter is entitled to this information. What is the problem?
The daughter is the resident's guardian, so disclosure to her is for a purpose connected with the resident's care, which section 168 of the Act allows. The frontier model provider is not. The email was drafted for one authorised recipient and sent, in draft, to an unauthorised one first.
Does the risperidone paragraph matter more than the rest?
Risperidone used to manage behaviour is a restrictive practice under the Act, and section 18 requires it to be used only as a last resort, with alternatives documented and the person's consent arrangements followed. A paragraph about changing the dose is part of that record, and it belongs inside the service until the decision is made properly.
How is a family email drafted on Ermos?
From the incident entry, the care plan and the progress notes on your own unit, in the service's usual tone. The nurse edits and sends it as she would any email. Nothing about the resident or her family leaves the building to write it.

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