Under a new initiative called “Care Data”, NHS England will upload medical records regularly from GP surgeries to a central system administered by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC). GPs have no choice but to supply the data and if patients don’t want it to happen, they must themselves opt out of the initiative.
Your date of birth, full postcode, NHS Number and gender rather than your name will be used to link your records in a secure system, managed by the HSCIC. Once this information has been linked, a new record will be created. This new record will not contain information that identifies you. The type of information shared, and how it is shared, is controlled by law and strict confidentiality rules.
The NHS wants to use this information to get a complete picture of what is happening across health and social care and to plan services according to what works best. The new system will provide joined-up information about the care received from all of the different parts of the health service, including hospitals and GP practices.
The data will be made available in various forms to researchers, local commissioning bodies and to private companies that are approved as HSCIC customers. Several such companies have already received approval.
NHS England is carrying out a mail drop to every household in England. Unfortunately this is being done in the form of a leaflet to households rather than a personal letter, and some students may not see it if they are living in shared accommodation or halls of residence.
If you do not wish to have your medical data uploaded from your GP surgery to HSCIC, it is vital that you opt out as soon as possible and preferably before March when the uploads begin. Once uploaded, the data will never be deleted, even if a patient later opts out. You can later opt-in if you initially opt-out.
More information, including opt-out letters can be found here: http://medconfidential.org/
For more information about the scheme see NHS England: http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/thenhs/records/healthrecords/Pages/care-data.aspx or contact Nat Kempston, Deputy President (Education).
