More than 1,000 confidential medical records have been left on the floor at a derelict former aged care facility operated by the New South Wales Government.

The privacy breach, uncovered in a triple j Hack and ABC News investigation, is believed to be one of the largest of its kind in Australian history.

The documents contain deeply intimate information of more than 400 vulnerable patients' personal profiles, medical conditions, behaviours, accidents, treatments, and medical history.

Among the documents are pain and incontinence charts, confidential social worker reports, doctor's referrals, hospital admission forms, a personal photo album, and an internal memo regarding a complaint from a daughter who was not notified when her father died.

This afternoon Hack and ABC News received a statement from NSW Health advising that an urgent investigation is now underway into the Centre’s document management and security systems.

"If it is found that any file notes have been inappropriately stored, the Centre will be contacting individuals, or their families to apologise," a NSW Health spokesperson said.

NSW Health claims the site has been illegally trespassed. ABC sources maintain that the site was not secured and had been accessed repeatedly by members of the public.

Meanwhile, the Shadow Minister for Health Walt Secord has called on NSW Health to conduct an independent and external investigation into the matter.

"This is not about apportioning blame, but this is about preventing it happening again and protecting the privacy of those affected," Mr Secord told Hack.

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Whatsapp Document detailing patients’ conditions found at the site. Names and identifying information have been redacted.

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Whatsapp Document detailing patient accidents found at the site. Names and identifying information have been redacted.

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Whatsapp Documents at the former site of the Garrawarra Centre for Aged Care

A copy of the facility’s confidentiality policy in regards to medical records was also found.

The records date from 1992 to 2002 and were found on the former site for the Garrawarra Centre for Aged Care in Helensburgh, which is currently operating nearby with a capacity of 120 dementia-specific beds.

The abandoned site is a popular destination for Youtubers to access and film 'haunted' tours.

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Hack believes that the majority, if not all, patients affected are deceased.

The NSW Government requires medical records of deceased patients at public hospitals to be retained for a minimum of ten years, then destroyed.

The story of how Hack obtained these documents starts on a winter’s weekend.

Sutherland woman Emma Lenz had heard about the abandoned Garrawarra cemetery and hospital in South Sydney before she stumbled across the derelict building complex on a bushwalk.

"It looks like the hotel in The Shining," Emma told Hack.

Inside Emma and her bushwalking partner would discover the first clues of an extraordinary NSW Government failing.

In one section of the unlocked and vandalised building, Emma found thousands of documents strewn among stubbed out cigarettes, drug paraphernalia, the carcass of a dead bird, empty spray cans and upturned furniture.

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"The entire room was covered with paperwork… and [I] realised that it's all kind of quite recent health records.

"I was thinking I must be overestimating the importance of the information...obviously if they've left it here, it's nothing.

"But it wasn’t until I came across this 'Register of Drugs of Addiction' with people's names...I kind of thought, 'Well if that was me, I'd be seriously worried about my information just left in an abandoned building like that'."

Emma soon got in touch with Hack.

"I don't think the police would have cared if I’d have called the police or NSW Health. I'm nobody," Emma says.

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Whatsapp Emma Lenz

The documents were not secured - they were found soiled, in disarray, and lying on the floor.

Hack obtained over a thousand additional sensitive records relating to patients and staff from the NSW run Garrawarra Centre for Aged Care which are kept securely. Hack then alerted the NSW Department of Health about the privacy breach. The ABC has offered to facilitate a safe collection of the documents by representatives from NSW Health.

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"I'm really disappointed that this is the respect we give to people who have passed away or been in our hospitals, who were part of our society," Emma told Hack.

Emma Lenz believes an apology "absolutely" needs to be made by NSW Health to patients or their families affected, and says an investigation needs to be made into how the breach occurred.

"I found it really disturbing, really disrespectful for whoever was in charge of this information to just leave it in an abandoned building where anyone could come along and find it.

"If that was my grandma, I’d be devastated."

Do you know someone who was a resident or staff member at the Garrawarra Centre for Aged care between 1992 - 2002? Get in touch: mccormack.angela@abc.net.au