Patient Record

Sharing Your Medical Record

Increasingly, patient medical data is shared e.g. between GP surgeries and other health providers, in order to give clinicians access to the most up to date information when attending patients. The systems we operate require that any sharing of medical information is consented to by patients beforehand. Patients must consent to sharing of the data held by a health provider out to other health providers and must also consent to which of the other providers can access their data.

e.g. it may be necessary to share data held in GP practices with district nurses but the local podiatry department would not need to see it to undertake their work. In this case, patients would allow the surgery to share their data, they would allow the district nurses to access it but they would not allow access by the podiatry department. In this way access to patient data is under patients' control and can be shared on a 'need to know' basis.

Patient medical data may also be shared with other organisations to support health and care planning and research.

If you do not want your personally identifiable patient data to be shared outside of your GP practice for purposes except your own care, you can register an opt-out by using this form Type1 Opt-out form. Type 1 Opt-outs may be discontinued in the future. If this happens then they may be turned into a National Datat Opt-out. More information about the National Data Opt-out can be found at https://www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters/

Collecting GP Data

Collecting GP data - advice for the public - NHS Digital

NHS Digital's improved collection of GP data will support vital health and care planning and research. Here we explain how and why you data is being used, and what to do if you don't want your data shared.

Emergency Care Summary

There is a Central NHS Computer System called the Emergency Care Summary (ECS). The Emergency Care Summary is meant to help emergency doctors and nurses help you when you contact them when the surgery is closed. It will contain information on your medications and allergies.

Your information will be extracted from practices such as ours and held securely on central NHS databases.   

As with all systems there are pros and cons to think about. When you speak to an emergency doctor you might overlook something that is important and if they have access to your medical record it might avoid mistakes or problems, although even then, you should be asked to give your consent each time a member of NHS Staff wishes to access your record, unless you are medically unable to do so.

On the other hand, you may have strong views about sharing your personal information and wish to keep your information at the level of this practice. If you don’t want an Emergency Care Summary to be made for you, tell your GP surgery. Don’t forget that if you do have an Emergency Care Summary, you will be asked if staff can look at it every time they need to. You don’t have to agree to this.