South Australia Health has been forced to apologise for a major privacy breach that has seen the confidential names and test results of more than 7200 children published online for more than a decade.

The breach relates to those who were treated at the Adelaide Women's and Children's Hospital for gastro, whooping cough and respiratory infections between 1996 and 2005.

The confidential information, which included names, birthdates and test results was accidentally embedded in a powerpoint presentation on infectious diseases and published on the hospital's website in 2005.

More than 7000 women's and children's hospital records were left in an online powerpoint for more than a decade. Picture: 9NEWS. (9NEWS)

The mistake was only uncovered this week, when a parent who 'Googled' their child's name found a link to the presentation and alerted authorities.

Investigations have also found that the data was uploaded without authorisation on two global document sharing websites.

SA Health said it knows the presentation was downloaded and viewed more than 300 times but it doesn't know who may have saved it.

The names and test results of 7200 people who attended the Adelaide Women's and Children's Hospital were posted to two global document sharing websites. Picture: 9NEWS. (9NEWS)

"Firstly I would like to apologise to the patients for this error... this is a regrettable incident from our perspective," said Phil Robinson, the Executive Director at the Women's and Children's Hospital.

"We have spoken to the author and they are very surprised that this has happened because it was completely inadvertent.

"I do wish to emphasise that... there's been no breach of our patient information systems."

The confidential information related to patients treated for gastro, whooping couch and respiratory infections between 1996 and 2005. Picture: 9NEWS. (9NEWS)

SA Health has found six other online presentations with similar data links that have now also been taken down.

"We will now need to ensure that no one is putting any identifying data into these spreadsheets," it said.

SA Health also said it hasn't individually contacted the thousands of patients impacted by the breach because the sheer number of people and age of the data make it too difficult.

The major breach comes just a day after the New South Wales Government announced an audit of its state medical records following a similar controversial release of patient data.

The major privacy breach comes just a day after a similar leak was uncovered in New South Wales. Picture: ABC. (ABC)

More than 1000 confidential patient documents dating between 1992 and 2002 were found on the floor of the abandoned Garrawarra Centre for Aged Care in Helensburgh, south of Sydney.

The documents that were uncovered in an ABC report were placed in the secured, fenced-off building - which has been abandoned due to contamination for almost 20 years - under a Labor government.

They were also not made available via an official breach of NSW Health systems, but by people who had illegally trespassed into the building since it has been abandoned.

More than 1000 private patient records were found left on the floor of an abandoned aged care centre south of Sydney. Picture: ABC. (ABC)

The NSW Government has promised an urgent investigation into the records, calling an audit into all state medical documents. Picture: ABC. (ABC)

Under NSW State Archives & Records protocol, state health documents can only be held for a minimum of 10 years after a patient's last attendance or contact with the facility.

After that point, they are then required to be destroyed - however almost two decades after the Garrawarra Centre was abandoned - the documents uncovered in Helensburgh had not been.