Dr Farzana Hussain is the Caldicott Guardian and Information Governance Lead for The Project Surgery.
This policy explains why we collect information about you, how that information may be used and how we keep it safe and confidential.
Healthcare professionals that provide you with care are required by law to maintain records about your health and any treatment or care you have received within any NHS organisation. These records help to provide you with the best possible healthcare.
We collect and hold data for the sole purpose of providing healthcare services to our patients.
What we collect about you:
The Project Surgery provides Primary Care General Practitioner Services.
Whilst you are registered at the practice we will keep records of any healthcare and treatment you have received either from ourselves or other clinicians previously (including Hospitals, out-of-hours etc). These records help to provide you with the best possible healthcare.
Records we may hold about you include:
- Your name, address, gender, age, contact details and next of kin
- Details of your appointments, clinic visits etc
- Records about your health, illness and treatment
- Results of investigations, like laboratory tests, x-rays, etc
- Information from other health professionals.
How we keep your information confidential and safe
Everyone working for the NHS is subject to the Common Law Duty of Confidence. Information provided in confidence will only be used for the purposes advised with consent given by the patient, unless there are other circumstances covered by the law. The Project Surgery complies with the NHS Confidentiality Code of Conduct. All our staff are required to protect your information and must complete mandatory training annually on information governance. They must inform you of how your information will be used and allow you to decide if and how your information can be shared. We hold information in accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998 and the General Data Protection Act.
We maintain our duty of confidentiality to you at all times. We will only ever use or pass on information about you if others involved in your care have a genuine need for it. We will not disclose your information to any third party without your permission unless there are exceptional circumstances (i.e. life or death situations), or where the law requires information to be passed on.
What and how your information is used
We primarily use information to enable our clinicians to better treat you and provide your healthcare. However, we also use your information to improve our services by:
- Reviewing the care we provide through clinical audit
- Investigating patient queries and complaints
- Ensuring we receive payment for the care you receive
- Auditing NHS services
- Undertaking health research (with your consent)
- Training and educating healthcare professionals.
Sharing your information
We share your personal information with other NHS organisations. For example, we may share your information for healthcare purposes with NHS trusts, Hospitals and Ambulance Services where they are directly involved in your care. We may need to share information from your health records with other non-NHS organisations, including Social Services. However, we will not disclose any health information to third parties without your explicit consent to do so, unless there are exceptional circumstances, such as when the health and safety of others is at risk or where the law requires it.
We may also be asked by other statutory bodies to share basic information about you, such as your name and address, but not sensitive information from your health records. This would normally be to assist them to carry out their statutory duties. In these circumstances, where it is not practical to obtain your explicit consent, we are informing you through this notice, which is referred to as a Fair Processing Notice, under the Data Protection Act that we may share that data.
These non-NHS organisations may include, but are not restricted to:
- Social Services
- Education Services
- Local Authorities
- Police
- Voluntary Sector Providers
- Private Sector Providers
The GP Practice is specifically required to share information for the following purposes:
Summary Care Record (SCR)
The NHS in England uses a national electronic record called the Summary Care Record (SCR) to support patient care. It contains key information from your GP record. Your SCR provides authorised healthcare staff with faster, secure access to essential information about you in an emergency or when you need unplanned care, where such information would otherwise be unavailable.
Summary Care Records are there to improve the safety and quality of your care. SCR core information comprises your allergies, adverse reaction’s and medications. An SCR with additional information can also include reason for medication, vaccinations, significant diagnoses / problems, significant procedures, anticipatory care information and end of life care information. Additional information can only be added to your SCR with your agreement.
Please be aware that if you choose to opt-out of SCR, NHS healthcare staff caring for you outside of this surgery may not be aware of your current medications, allergies you suffer from and any bad reactions to medicines you have had. Your records will stay as they are now with information being shared by letter, email or phone. If you wish to opt-out of having an SCR then please let us know.
Risk Stratification
Risk stratification is a process for proactively identifying and managing patients who are statistically at-risk of unplanned admission to hospital or likely to require additional healthcare input.
Information about you is collected from a number of sources including NHS Trusts and GP Practices. A risk score is then arrived at through an analysis of your de-identified information using software managed by an agreed third party provider and is then provided back to us. If necessary we may be able to offer you additional services, following this risk stratification process.
Risk stratification is commissioned by the NHS Newham Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG). Section 251 of the NHS Act 2006 provides a statutory legal basis to process data for risk stratification purposes. Further information about risk stratification is available from:
If you are registered with us and do not wish information about you to be included in the risk stratification programme, please let us know. We can add a code to your records that will stop your information from being used for this purpose. Our other services are not subject to Risk Stratification purposes.
Individual Funding Request
An Individual Funding Request is a request made on your behalf and with your consent by a clinician, for funding of specialised healthcare which falls outside the range of services and treatments that CCG has agreed to commission for the local population. An Individual Funding Request is considered when a case can be set out by a patient’s clinician that there are exceptional clinical circumstances which make the patient’s case different from other patients with the same condition who are at the same stage of their disease, or when the request is for a treatment that is regarded as new or experimental and where there are no other similar patients who would benefit from this treatment. A detailed response including the criteria considered in arriving at the decision, will be provided to the patient’s clinician.
Supporting Medicines Management
CCGs support local GP practices with prescribing queries which generally do not require identifiable information. CCG pharmacists work with all Newham practices to provide advice on medicines and prescribing queries, and review prescribing of medicines to ensure that it is safe and cost-effective.
Clinical Audit
Information may be used for clinical audit to monitor the quality of the service provided. Some of this information may be held centrally and used for statistical purposes e.g. the National Diabetes Audit. This is unidentifiable and is extracted directly from the clinical system.
Clinical Research
Sometimes your information may be requested to be used for research purposes, we will always gain your consent for this.
Safeguarding
To ensure that adult and children’s safeguarding matters are managed appropriately, access to identifiable information will be shared in some limited circumstances where it is required for the safety of the individuals concerned.
The NHS England Constitution
The NHS Constitution establishes the principles and values of the NHS in England. It sets out the rights patients, the public and staff are entitled to. These rights cover how patients access health services, the quality of care you’ll receive, the treatments and programmes available to you, confidentiality, information and your right to complain if things go wrong.
NHS Digital
NHS Digital collects health information from the records health and social care providers keep about the care and treatment they give, to promote health or support improvements in the delivery of care services in England.
Other organisations
The practice may be asked to share your details with other organisations in the form of private medical reports, or extracts from your medical records – perhaps to assist you with a mortgage of life insurance/assurance application. We will only do this once we are in possession of your explicit consent and you are entitled to have access to any report we make about you.
Access to your information
Under the General Data Protection Regulation everybody has the right to see or have a copy of the information we hold, with some exceptions. You do not need to give a reason to see your medical record. If you want to access your medical record you must make the request in writing. Under special circumstances, some information may be withheld. If you wish to have a copy of the information we hold about you, please contact us.
Your right to withdraw consent for us to share your personal information
At any time you have the right to refuse/withdraw consent to information sharing. The consequences of this will be explained to you.
Data Controller
The General Data Protection Regulation requires organisations to register a notification with the Information Commissioner to describe the purposes for which they process personal and sensitive information. We are registered as a data controller and our registration can be viewed online in the public register at:
Complaints
If you have concerns or are unhappy about any of our services please contact us using the details below:
F.A.O Practice Manager
The Project Surgery
10 Lettsom Walk
Plaistow
London
E13 0LN
For independent advice about data protection, privacy and data-sharing issues, you can contact:
The Information Commissioner
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
0303 123 1113
