Policies and Procedures

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

Data Protection Privacy Notice for Candidates applying for work

Introduction: 

This privacy notice lets you know what happens to any personal data that you give to us, or any that we may collect from or about you.

This privacy notice applies to personal information processed by or on behalf of the practice.

This Notice explains

• Who we are, how we use your information and our Data Protection Officer
• What kinds of personal information about you do we process?
• What are the legal grounds for our processing of your personal information (including when we share it with others)?
• What should you do if your personal information changes?
• For how long your personal information is retained by us?
• What are your rights under data protection laws?

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) became law on 24th May 2016. This is a regulation on the protection of confidential and sensitive information. It entered into force in the UK on the 25th May 2018, repealing the Data Protection Act (1998), being supplemented by the Data Protection Act 2018.

For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the UK General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (UK) 2016/679) (the “UKGDPR”), and the Data Protection Act 2018 the practice responsible for your personal data is [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

This Notice describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how, in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights.

This Privacy Policy applies to the personal data collected from Candidates applying for roles within the practice.

How we use your information and the law.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will be what’s known as the ‘Controller’ of the personal data you provide to us.

Upon commencement of employment with the company you will be asked to supply the following personal information:

Name, address, telephone numbers, email address, date of birth, national insurance number, bank details, emergency contact information and health information.

The information that we ask you to provide to the company is required by the business for the following reasons:

• In order for us review your application
• In order for us to contact you for interview details
• Comply with appropriate Employment law
• To ensure that we can provide any reasonable adjustments as necessary

We ask that you provide ID for copying to comply with our responsibilities as an employer under section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration Act 1996.

Throughout the application process we will collect data and add to your file i.e. interview scores etc

How do we lawfully use your data?

We need to know your personal, sensitive and confidential data in order to Employ you, under the General Data Protection Regulation we will be lawfully using your information in accordance with: –

Article 6, (b) Necessary for performance of/entering into contract with you

Article 9(2) (b) Necessary for controller to fulfil employment rights or obligations in employment.

This Privacy Notice applies to the personal data of our Candidates.

How do we maintain the confidentiality of your records? 

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will only use information collected lawfully in accordance with:

• Data Protection Act 2018
• The UK General Data Protection Regulation 2016
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Common Law Duty of Confidentiality
• NHS Codes of Confidentiality, Information Security and Records Management

We will only ever use or pass on information about you if others who 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), where the law requires information to be passed on.

Our practice policy is to respect the privacy of our candidates and to maintain compliance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and all UK specific Data Protection Requirements. Our policy is to ensure all personal data related to our candidates will be protected.

All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. The practice will, if required, sign a separate confidentiality agreement if the client deems it necessary.  If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

In certain circumstances you may have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of data. Please contact the Data Protection Officer in writing if you wish to withdraw your consent.  If some circumstances we may need to store your data after your consent has been withdrawn to comply with a legislative requirement.

Where do we store your information Electronically?

All the personal data we process is processed by our candidates in the UK however for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance this information may be located on servers within the European Union.

No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so and appropriate safeguards have been put in place.  We have a Data Protection regime in place to oversee the effective and secure processing of your personal and or special category (sensitive, confidential) data.

Who are our partner organisations?

We may also have to share your information, subject to strict agreements on how it will be used, with the following organisations;

• NHS Commissioning Support Units
• Clinical Commissioning Groups
• NHS England (NHSE) and NHS Digital (NHSD)
• Local Authorities
• CQC
• Private Sector Providers providing employment services
• Other ‘data processors’ which you will be informed of

You will be informed who your data will be shared with and in some cases asked for consent for this happen when this is required.

We may also use external companies to process personal information, such as for archiving purposes. These companies are bound by contractual agreements to ensure information is kept confidential and secure.  All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

How long will we store your information?

We are required under UK tax law to keep your information and data for the full retention periods as specified by the UK Employment legislation as below

How can you access, amend move the personal data that you have given to us?

Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise.

Right to object: If we are using your data because we deem it necessary for our legitimate interests to do so, and you do not agree, you have the right to object. We will respond to your request within 30 days (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases). Generally, we will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply.

Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example for a research project), or consent to market to you, you may withdraw your consent at any time.

Right to erasure: In certain situations (for example, where we have processed your data unlawfully), you have the right to request us to “erase” your personal data. We will respond to your request within 30 days (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases) and will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply. If we do agree to your request, we will Delete your data but will generally assume that you would prefer us to keep a note of your name on our register of individuals who would prefer not to be contacted. That way, we will minimise the chances of you being contacted in the future where your data are collected in unconnected circumstances. If you would prefer us not to do this, you are free to say so.

Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your data from us to another data controller.

Access to your personal information 

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You have a right under the Data Protection legislation to request access to view or to obtain copies of what information the surgery holds about you and to have it amended should it be inaccurate. To request this, you need to do the following:

• Your request should be made in writing to the Practice
• There is no charge to have a copy of the information held about you
• We are required to respond to you within one month

What should you do if your personal information changes?

You should tell us so that we can update our records please contact the Practice Manager as soon as any of your details change, this is especially important for changes of address or contact details (such as your mobile phone number), the practice will from time to time ask you to confirm that the information we currently hold is accurate and up-to-date.

 Objections / Complaints

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed at the Surgery, please contact the GP Practice Manager or the Data Protection Officer as above. If you are still unhappy following a review by the GP practice, you have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe house, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 01625 545745

https://ico.org.uk/

If you are happy for your data to be extracted and used for the purposes described in this privacy notice, then you do not need to do anything.  If you have any concerns about how your data is shared, then please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

If you would like to know more about your rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as below.

Data Protection Officer:

The Practice Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey of PCIG Consulting Limited. Any queries in regard to Data Protection issues should be addressed to him at: –

Email:   [email protected]

Postal: PCIG Consulting Limited, 7 Westacre Drive, Quarry Bank, Dudley, West Midlands, DY5 2EE

Changes:

It is important to point out that we may amend this Privacy Notice from time to time.  If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of our Privacy Notice, please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

1. Introduction

• The practice attaches the highest importance to ensuring that a culture that values patient privacy and dignity exists within our organisation. This policy applies to the care of patients who require clinical support of an intimate nature.
• Intimate and personal care is a key area of a person’s self-image and respect. The apparent intimate nature of many health care interventions, if not practised in a sensitive and respectful manner, can lead to misinterpretation and occasionally, allegations of abuse.
• Failure to understand the cultural background of a patient can lead to confusion and misunderstanding with some patients believing they have been the subject of abuse.

2. Scope of Policy

• This policy applies to all staff employed by Umbrella medical including General Practitioners, Doctors in training, Nurses, Healthcare Care Assistants, medical/nursing students and other staff including those employed by the PCN (primary care network), locums and bank/agency staff that are working on behalf of the practice and involved in the clinical care of patients.

3. Responsibilities

• All staff have a professional duty to care for patients. It is the responsibility of all healthcare professionals to manage and maintain professional boundaries.
• All clinical staff including Doctors, Nurses and allied healthcare professionals have responsibilities (including under their professional bodies) to act in their patient’s best interests and are accountable for their actions. Staff should be sensitive to differing expectations associated with race, ethnicity, culture, gender, disabilities and vulnerable people.
• Staff that provide clinical care of an intimate nature are responsible for ensuring that their actions comply with this policy nd also keep up to date with any new guidance produced by their own professional regulatory bodies (GMC, NMC etc).
• Patients should be informed of the practice’s chaperone policy, with written information being available either on the website or in the form of a leaflet.
• Chaperone advice posters are displayed on the Practice notice boards and in each consulting and treatment room.

4. Intimate Examinations

• Intimate examinations or procedures can be embarrassing or distressing for patients. Before a clinician carries out an intimate examination or procedure, it is essential that every effort is made to ensure patients feel as safe and in control of the situation as possible.
• Intimate examinations can be carried out for a variety of reasons (such as assessment, diagnosis, treatment and screening), and can take place in a variety of settings, including in person and remote consultations, such as by video-link or other digital technology.
• Intimate examinations are likely to include examinations of breasts, genitalia and rectum, but could also include any examination where it is necessary to touch, examine intimate parts of the patient’s body digitally, or even be close to the patient.
• Some patients may have particular concerns about undressing or exposing parts of their body but feel hesitant to speak up. Examinations by a member of the opposite gender are also, in some cultures and religions, effectively taboo.

5. Chaperones

• All patients have the right to have a chaperone present. A chaperone is an impartial observer present during an intimate examination of a patient. You should clearly explain to the patient what the chaperone’s role is.
• A chaperone is there for the patient. Their role includes helping to reassure the patient if they experience distress, protecting the patient’s dignity and confidentiality at all times, offering emotional support at an embarrassing or uncomfortable time or facilitating communication, especially if there is a language barrier.
• A chaperone also provides a safeguard for both patient and clinician, and can discourage unfounded allegations of improper behaviour. A chaperone should be given the chance to ask questions if anything about their role is not clear to them prior to the examination.
• The use of a chaperone when undertaking an intimate examination should be a consideration regardless of the gender of the patient i.e. even if the clinician and the patient are of the same gender. Their presence adds a layer of protection for the clinician, whilst acknowledging the patient’s vulnerability and helping to provide reassurance and support.
• Some patients may require a chaperone for other examinations too. For example, particularly vulnerable patients or those who have suffered abuse may need a chaperone for examinations where it is necessary to touch or be close to them.
• Chaperoning must only be undertaken by appropriately trained staff, however, they do not need to be medically qualified.
• A chaperone must be prepared to raise concerns about a healthcare professional if misconduct occurs (Duty of Candour – CQC regulation 20). The Umbrella Medical Whistleblowing Policy & Procedure should be adhered to at all times.
• A relative or friend of the patient is not a trained impartial observer and so would not usually be a suitable chaperone. However, the presence of a chaperone does not override a patient’s wish to be supported by a relative, friend or advocate. You should comply with a reasonable request from the patient to have such a person present as well as a chaperone.
• Patients should be offered a chaperone to be with them during any intimate examination or procedure.
• The presence of a chaperone must be the expressed choice of the patient. This must be clearly documented in the clinical record.
• Patients have a right to refuse a chaperone and/or request someone different from the person originally offered to act as a chaperone.
• If a clinician is unwilling to conduct an intimate examination without a chaperone, they should explain to the patient why they would prefer to have one present. They may need to offer an alternative appointment or an alternative clinician who would be willing to examine the patient without a chaperone, as long as the delay would not adversely affect the patient’s health. Any such discussion must be documented in the clinical record.
• You should record the detail and outcome of any discussion about chaperones in the patient’s medical record. If a chaperone is present during an examination, you should record that fact and make a note of their identity and role. If the patient does not want a chaperone, you should record that the offer was made and declined.

6. Procedure when Conducting Intimate Examinations and Procedures

Prior to examination/procedure:

• Establish that there is a genuine need for an intimate examination/ procedure and discuss this with the patient.
• Explain to the patient why the examination/procedure is necessary and give the patient an opportunity to ask questions. Discuss any alternatives there might be, if any.
• Explain what the examination/procedure will involve in a way that the patient can understand, so that the patient has a clear idea of what to expect, including any pain or discomfort. Explain to the patient that they can ask at any time for the examination to stop.
• Always obtain the patient’s informed consent before the examination/ procedure.
• A record of consent must be obtained in accordance to the practice Consent to Examination and Treatment Policy.
• If the patient is a child or young person you must assess their capacity to consent to the examination. If they lack the capacity to consent, you must seek their parent’s consent or make sure you have other valid authority.
• If the patient lacks capacity to consent to treatment or examination (e.g. if they have severe learning difficulties), decisions may be taken by the clinician to act in the patient’s best interests. In scenarios, all action must be carefully considered and be in accordance with the Practice’s Consent to Examination or Treatment Policy, the GMC’s Good Medical Practice and all Government legislation, particularly the Mental Capacity Act 2005.
• Consider and address any communication barriers that could impact on the patient’s experience or understanding of an intimate examination. Where the patient is not able to fully understand the information given, it is the responsibility of the member of staff to explore ways of presenting information in a more accessible manner.
• When a patient decides not to give consent, they normally has the right to have their decision respected. Only in circumstances of immediate necessity, when the patient lacks capacity (see Mental Capacity Act, 2005), should an intervention be made.
• All staff will offer a chaperone to be present during the intimate examination/procedure and explain what their role will be. If a chaperone is present this must be recorded and a note made of the chaperone’s identity. Chaperones should also document their attendance in the medical records. Equally, if the patient does not want a chaperone, this should be recorded in the clinical notes.
• If for justifiable reasons a chaperone cannot be offered immediately this should be explained to the patient and an offer made to delay the examination/procedure taking into account their clinical needs. This discussion must be recorded along with its outcome.
• You should give the patient privacy to undress and dress, and keep them covered as much as possible to maintain their dignity. Do not help the patient to remove clothing unless they have asked you to, or you have checked with them that they want you to help.
• Be aware and respectful of cultural differences.
• Advice on chaperones should be explored when routine appointments are made which will involve an intimate examination or procedure. For example: Cervical Screening.

During the examination/procedure:

• Explain what you are doing at each stage of the examination/procedure. If this differs from what you have told the patient before, explain why and seek the patient’s permission. Be prepared to stop at any time if the patient asks you to.
• The amount of the patient’s body that is exposed should only be what is necessary to carry out the examination/procedure.
• Keep comments professional and relevant to the clinical examination. Unnecessary personal comments may cause distress or offence.
• Check whether the patient has any questions during the examination but avoid unnecessary discussion with other staff members.
• Ensure the patient’s privacy and dignity is protected at all times.
• Invite the patient to tell you if the examination becomes uncomfortable. While performing the examination, be alert for any signs of pain or discomfort and check that the patient agrees for you to continue.

On completion of the examination/ procedure:

• Keep the presence of the chaperone to a minimum. There is no need for them to be involved in any subsequent discussion.
• Explain the outcome once the examination/procedure is complete and give an explanation of what you propose to do next.
• Address any queries relating to the examination/procedure.
• Clinician to record details of which staff member chaperoned. Record any other relevant issues or concerns immediately.
• The member of staff who was the chaperone should also document their attendance in the electronic patient medical record.

7. Chaperone training

All staff at Umbrella Medical will receive chaperone training either online via Agilio Teamnet or via in-house training every 12 months. New staff will receive chaperone training before commencing their role as a chaperone, once an Enhanced DBS certificate has been provided.

8. References

Intimate examinations and chaperones (General Medical Council Good Medical Practice December 2023)

Intimate examinations and the use of chaperones (Royal College of Nursing 2015)

Professional Standards of Practice and Behaviour for nurses, midwives and nursing associates (2018)

Regulation 11: Need for consent – Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014

Chaperones: The who, when and what of having a chaperone present during intimate examinations (MDU January 2022)

Children’s Privacy Notice

 WHAT IS A PRIVACY NOTICE AND WHY DOES IT APPLY TO ME?

A Privacy Notice tells people how organisations use information that they hold about them. A new law called the UK General Data Protection Regulation 2016, also known as UKGDPR, says that we need to provide you with this Privacy Notice and let you know:

• What information we hold about you
• How we keep this especially important information safe and secure and where we keep it
• How we use your information
• Who we share your information with
• What your rights are
• When the law gives us permission to use your information

 WHY DOES THE LAW GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO USE MY INFORMATION?

The law gives us permission to use your information in situations where we need it to take care of you. Because information about your health is very personal, sensitive and private to you, the law is very strict about how we use it.

So, before we can use your information in the ways we have set out in this Privacy Notice, we have to have a good reason in law, which is called a ‘lawful basis’.  Not only do we have to do that, but we also have to show that your information falls into a special group or category, because it is very sensitive. By doing this the law makes sure we only use your information to look after you and that we do not use it for any other reason.

If you would like more information about this please ask to speak to our Data Protection Officer (DPO) mentioned in this Privacy Notice who will explain this in more detail.

ABOUT US

We, at [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice), are responsible for collecting, storing and handling your information when you registered with us as a patient. Because we do this, the law says we are Data Controllers. Sometimes we may use your information for a particular purpose and when we do so, the law says we are Data Processors.

WHAT INFORMATION DO YOU HOLD ABOUT ME?

We hold information about you such as:

• Your name
• Address
• Mobile number
• Information about your parent(s) or person with parental responsibility
• All your health records
• Appointment records
• Visits to see your GP
• Treatments you have had
• Medicines prescribed for you and any other information to help us look after you

 HOW DO YOU KEEP IT SAFE?

• The law says that we must do all we can to keep your information private, safe and secure.
• We use secure computer systems and we make sure that any written information held about you is under lock and key and kept in a safe place. This includes taking great care with any passwords we use which we change on a regular basis. We also train our staff to respect your privacy and deal with your information in a manner that makes sure it is always kept and dealt with in a safe way.

WHAT DO YOU DO WITH MY INFORMATION?

• We only usually use your information to help us care for you. That means we might need to share your information with other people who are concerned and involved with looking after your health.
• We might need to share your information with the police, courts, social services, solicitors and other people who have a right to your information, but we always make sure that they have a legal right to see it (or have a copy of it) before we provide it to them.

WHO ELSE WILL SEE MY INFORMATION?

• Usually only doctors, nurses and other people who work with us are allowed to see your information.
• Sometimes though, if you need to go to the hospital or be seen by a special doctor, we will share your information with them but this only so that we can take care of you.
• Sometimes we might be asked to take part in medical research that might help you in the future. We will always ask you or your parent(s) or adult with parental responsibility if we can share your information if this happens.
• Possibly the police, social services, the courts and other organisations and people who may have a legal right to see your information.

WHAT ARE MY RIGHTS?

• If you want to see what information we hold about you then you have a right to see it and you can ask for it.
• To ask for your information you will usually need to put your request in writing and tell us what information you want us to give you.
• We usually need to answer you within one month. Your parent(s) or adult with parental responsibility can help you with is if you need help.
• Usually we will give this to you free of charge.
• If you think there are any errors in the information we hold about you then you can ask us to correct it but the law says we can’t remove any of the information we hold about you even if you ask us to. This is because we need this information to take care of you.
• You have a right to ask us not to share your information.
• If you would like to talk to us about not sharing your information, even if this means you don’t want us to share your information with your parent(s) or adult with parental responsibility, please let us know. We will be happy to help.

WHAT IF I HAVE A QUESTION?

• A member of our staff/receptionist will be happy to talk to you about any questions you may have and we will do our best to help you.
• The Surgery has a person called a Data Protection Officer (DPO) who deals with all queries about patient information. Our receptionist may put you in touch with this person who will listen to your concerns and give you the advice you need.
• Our DPO is called Paul Couldrey and he can be contacted at [email protected].

WHAT IF I HAVE A SERIOUS COMPLAINT ABOUT HOW YOU LOOK AFTER MY INFORMATION?

• We will always do our best to look after your information and to answer your questions.
• If you are still not happy with something we have done with your information you can speak to our DPO.
• If our DPO has not been able to help you or if you prefer not to speak to our DPO then you have a right to pass your complaint to an organisation called the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) who will look into what has gone wrong. For more information visit ico.org.uk

UPDATES TO THIS PRIVACY NOTICE

• The law says we must keep all information we provide in this Privacy Notice up to date.
• This Privacy Notice was last updated on 18/12/2023 and will be reviewed on 18/12/2025

COVID-19 Privacy Notice

(This Privacy Notice is to run alongside our standard Practice Privacy Notice)

As we move away from the initial response to COVID-19 the health and social care system will need to continue to take action to manage and mitigate the spread and impact of the outbreak. This includes ensuring that approved researchers can continue to securely access pseudonymised data held by GP IT systems to assist the health and care service’s response to COVID-19 by, for example:

• recognising trends in COVID-19 diseases and identifying risks it poses
• controlling and preventing the spread of COVID-19
• monitoring and managing outbreaks

The OpenSAFELY COVID-19 research service provides a secure analytics service that supports COVID-19 research, COVID-19 clinical audit, COVID-19 service evaluation and COVID-19 health surveillance purposes.

Under the COVID-19 Public Health Directions 2020 NHS England has been directed by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to establish and operate the OpenSAFELY service.  While each GP practice remains the data controller of its own patient data, they are required under the provisions of s259 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012 to provide access to de-identified (pseudonymised) patient data through the OpenSAFELY service.

The service enables individuals (academics, analysts and data scientists) approved by NHS England to run queries on pseudonymised GP and NHS England patient data which is held within the GP system suppliers’ data environments.  Controls are in place to ensure that individuals only have access to aggregated outputs from the service (i.e. they cannot access information that either directly or indirectly identifies individuals).

Purpose of this Notice

OpenSAFELY service is used to analyse de-identified (pseudonymised) data within the EMIS and TPP boundaries, to support COVID-19 related research.

This is a continuation of a service which is supported by the BMA which has been operating since 2020. The permanent legal basis (the COVID-19 Direction) above allows the practice to provide this data to NHSE as an ongoing service.

The OpenSAFELY service is a Trusted Research Environment (TRE) established within the secure environment of EMIS and TPP. Researchers write their analysis code away from the patient data; the code is run automatically on de-identified (pseudonymised) patient data; and only the aggregated outputs (now anonymous) are shared with researchers to be used, for example, in journal publications, reports or presentations.

These controls keep patient data secure inside EMIS and TPP and confidential from researchers. The use of TREs and the data processing principles which OpenSAFELY represents is supported by the RCGP.

To date, this service has supported a range of important COVID-19 related research, including one of the world’s first and largest studies to identify the clinical factors associated with COVID-19 related death, which informed the national COVID-19 vaccination strategy and Green Book guidance. Other studies have also informed COVID-19 related NICE guidance and decisions made by SAGE.

All NHS England approved research studies are published online, including sharing the exact analysis code each study used to analyse the patient data, by whom and when such code was run. In future, NHSE will also publish approvals on our data release register.

During the pandemic, and in the recovery phase, de-identified data has been crucial in helping to save lives. It has supported research into COVID-19 and the ways that it has affected our lives, our health, and to identify effective medicines and treatments.

Research has helped to identify new treatments for COVID-19 and to understand how we can keep our communities safe. Data has helped us to prioritise the right care to the most vulnerable in our society and to develop vaccines to protect against COVID-19.

If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected].

Recording of processing

A record will be kept by Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

of all data processed under this Notice.

Sending Public Health Messages

Data protection and electronic communication laws will not stop Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) from sending public health messages to you, either by phone, text or email as these messages are not direct marketing.

Digital Consultations

It may also be necessary, where the latest technology allows [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) to do so, to use your information and health data to facilitate digital consultations and diagnoses and we will always do this with your security in mind.

Creating a new NHS England: NHS England and NHS Digital merged on 1 February 2023. All references to NHS Digital now, or in the future, relate to NHS England.

 Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

 Data Protection Privacy Notice for Staff

 Introduction:

 This privacy notice lets you know what happens to any personal data that you give to us, or any that we may collect from or about you.

This privacy notice applies to personal information processed by or on behalf of Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

This Notice explains

• Who we are, how we use your information and our Data Protection Officer
• What kinds of personal information about you do we process?
• What are the legal grounds for our processing of your personal information (including when we share it with others)?
• What should you do if your personal information changes?
• For how long your personal information is retained by us?
• What are your rights under data protection laws?
• Enable monitoring of staff vaccination status

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UKGDPR) became law on 24th May 2016. This is a regulation on the protection of confidential and sensitive information. It entered into force in the UK on the 25th of May 2018, repealing the Data Protection Act (1998) with the new Data Protection Act 2018 supplementing it.

 For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the UK General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (UK) 2016/679) (the “UKGDPR”), and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA2018) the organisation responsible for your personal data is Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

 This Notice describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how, in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights

This Privacy Policy applies to the personal data of our Employees.

How we use your information and the law.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will be what’s known as the ‘Controller’ of the personal data you provide to us.

Upon commencement of employment with the company you will be asked to supply the following personal information:

Name, address, telephone numbers, email address, date of birth, national insurance number, bank details, emergency contact information and health information.

The information that we ask you to provide to the company is required by the business for the following reasons:

• In order for us to pay your salary
• In order for us to contact you out of hours if required
• To provide you with company information via email and post if required
• To have the ability to contact your emergency contacts if necessary
• To ensure we are able to inform the emergency services if your health is compromised
• To ensure that we can provide any reasonable adjustments as necessary
• To comply with payroll, auto-enrolment and RTI responsibilities.

We ask that you provide ID for copying to comply with our responsibilities as an employer under section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration Act 1996.

Throughout your employment we will collect data and add to your personnel file i.e. appraisal paperwork, communications, absence information and changes to personnel data.

 How do we lawfully use your data?

We need to know your personal, sensitive and confidential data in order to Employ you, under the General Data Protection Regulation we will be lawfully using your information in accordance with: –

• Article 6, (b) Necessary for performance of/entering into contract with you
• Article 9(2) (b) Necessary for controller to fulfil employment rights or obligations in employment.

This Privacy Notice applies to the personal data of our employees and the data you have given us about your carers/family members.

How do we maintain the confidentiality of your records? 

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will only use information collected lawfully in accordance with:

• Data Protection Act 2018
• The UK General Data Protection Regulations 2016
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Common Law Duty of Confidentiality
• NHS Codes of Confidentiality, Information Security and Records Management

We will only ever use or pass on information about you if others who 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), where the law requires information to be passed on.

Our policy is to respect the privacy of our staff and to maintain compliance with the UK General Data Protection Regulations (UKGDPR) and all UK specific Data Protection Requirements. Our policy is to ensure all personal data related to our staff will be protected.

All employees and sub-contractors engaged by Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will, if required, sign a separate confidentiality agreement if the client deems it necessary.  If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

In Certain circumstances you may have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of data. Please contact the Data Protection Officer in writing if you wish to withdraw your consent.  If some circumstances we may need to store your data after your consent has been withdrawn to comply with a legislative requirement.

Where do we store your information electronically?

All the personal data we process is processed by our staff in the UK however for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance this information may be located on servers within the European Union.

No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so and appropriate safeguards have been put in place.  We have a Data Protection regime in place to oversee the effective and secure processing of your personal and or special category (sensitive, confidential) data.

Who are our partner organisations?

We may also have to share your information, subject to strict agreements on how it will be used, with the following organisations;

• NHS Commissioning Support Units
• Clinical Commissioning Groups
• NHS England (NHSE) and NHS Digital (NHSD)
• Local Authorities
• CQC
• Private Sector Providers providing employment services
• Other ‘data processors’ which you will be informed of

You will be informed who your data will be shared with and in some cases asked for consent for this happen when this is required.

We may also use external companies to process personal information, such as for archiving purposes. These companies are bound by contractual agreements to ensure information is kept confidential and secure.  All employees and sub-contractors engaged by Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

How long will we store your information?

We are required under UK tax law to keep your information and data for the full retention periods as specified by the UK Employment legislation.

Employee personnel files will be stored for a period of seven years for the purpose of any legal claims.

How can you access, amend move the personal data that you have given to us?

Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise.

Right to object: If we are using your data because we deem it necessary for our legitimate interests to do so, and you do not agree, you have the right to object. We will respond to your request within 30 days (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases). Generally, we will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply.

Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example for a research project), or consent to market to you, you may withdraw your consent at any time.

Right to erasure: In certain situations (for example, where we have processed your data unlawfully), you have the right to request us to “erase” your personal data. We will respond to your request within 30 days (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases) and will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply. If we do agree to your request, we will delete your data but will generally assume that you would prefer us to keep a note of your name on our register of individuals who would prefer not to be contacted. That way, we will minimise the chances of you being contacted in the future where your data are collected in unconnected circumstances. If you would prefer us not to do this, you are free to say so.

Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your data from us to another data controller.

Access to your personal information 

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You have a right under the Data Protection legislation to request access to view or to obtain copies of what information this organisation holds about you and to have it amended should it be inaccurate. To request this, you need to do the following:

• Your request should be made in writing to the Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)
• There is no charge to have a copy of the information held about you
• We are required to respond to you within one month

What should you do if your personal information changes?

You should tell us so that we can update our records please contact the Head of Support Services as soon as any of your details change, this is especially important for changes or address or contact details (such as your mobile phone number), Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will from time to time ask you to confirm that the information we currently hold is accurate and up-to-date.

Objections / Complaints

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed, please contact the Head of Support Services or the Data Protection Officer as above. If you are still unhappy following a review by the organisation, you have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 01625 545745

www.ico.org.uk

If you are happy for your data to be extracted and used for the purposes described in this privacy notice, then you do not need to do anything.  If you have any concerns about how your data is shared, then please contact the Data Protection Officer.

If you would like to know more about your rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as below.

Data Protection Officer:

The Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey of PCIG Consulting Limited. Any queries in regard to Data Protection issues should be addressed to him at: –

Email: [email protected]

Postal: PCIG Consulting Limited, 7 Westacre Drive, Quarry Bank, Dudley, West Midlands, DY5 2EE

Changes:

It is important to point out that we may amend this Privacy Notice from time to time.  If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of our Privacy Notice, please contact the Data Protection Officer.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

Data Protection Privacy Notice for Patients

Introduction:

This privacy notice lets you know what happens to any personal data that you give to us, or any information that we may collect from you or about you from other organisations.

This privacy notice applies to personal information processed by or on behalf of the practice.

This Notice explains

• Who we are and how we use your information
• Information about our Data Protection Officer
• What kinds of personal information about you we hold and use (process)
• The legal grounds for our processing of your personal information (including when we share it with others)
• What should you do if your personal information changes?
• For how long your personal information is retained / stored by us?
• What are your rights under Data Protection laws

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UKGDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) became law on 25th May 2018, and 1^st January 2021 when the UK exited the EU.

For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (UK) 2016/679) (the “UKGDPR”), and the Data Protection Act 2018 the practice responsible for your personal data is Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

This Notice describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights.

How we use your information and the law.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will be what’s known as the ‘Controller’ of your personal data.

We collect basic personal data about you and location-based information.  This does include name, address and contact details such as email and mobile number etc.

We will also collect sensitive confidential data known as “special category personal data”, in the form of health information, religious belief (if required in a healthcare setting) ethnicity and sex life information that are linked to your healthcare, we may also receive this information about you from other health providers or third parties.

Why do we need your information?

The health care professionals who provide you with care maintain records about your health and any treatment or care you have received previously.  These records help to provide you with the best possible healthcare and treatment.

NHS health records may be electronic, paper-based or a mixture of both.  We use a combination of working practices and technology to ensure that your information is kept confidential and secure.

Records about you may include the following information;

• Details about you, such as your address, your carer or legal representative and emergency contact details.
• Any contact the surgery has had with you, such as appointments, clinic visits, emergency appointments.
• Notes and reports about your health.
• Details about your treatment and care.
• Results of investigations such as laboratory tests, x-rays etc.
• Relevant information from other health professionals, relatives or those who care for you.
• Contact details (including email address, mobile telephone number and home telephone number)

To ensure you receive the best possible care, your records are used to facilitate the care you receive, including contacting you. Information held about you may be used to help protect the health of the public and to help us manage the NHS and the services we provide. Limited information may be used within the GP practice for clinical audit to monitor the quality of the service we provided.

How do we lawfully use your data?

We need your personal, sensitive and confidential data in order to provide you with healthcare services as a General Practice, under the General Data Protection Regulation we will be lawfully using your information in accordance with: –

Article 6, e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller;”

Article 9, (h) processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems

This Privacy Notice applies to the personal data of our patients and the data you have given us about your carers/family members.

We use your personal and healthcare information in the following ways:

• when we need to speak to or contact other doctors, consultants, nurses or any other medical/healthcare professional or organisation during your diagnosis or treatment or ongoing healthcare; this includes the use of telephone or video consultation.
• when we are required by law to hand over your information to any other organisation, such as the police, by court order, solicitors, or immigration enforcement.
• In a de-identified form to support planning of health services and to improve health outcomes for our population

We will never pass on your personal information to anyone else who does not need it, or has no right to it, unless you give us consent to do so.

Legal justification for collecting and using your information

The law says we need a legal basis to handle your personal and healthcare information.

Contract: We have a contract with NHS England to deliver healthcare services to you. This contract provides that we are under a legal obligation to ensure that we deliver medical and healthcare services to the public.

Consent: Sometimes we also rely on the fact that you give us consent to use your personal and healthcare information so that we can take care of your healthcare needs.

Please note that you have the right to withdraw consent at any time if you no longer wish to receive services from us.

Necessary care: Providing you with the appropriate healthcare, where necessary. The Law refers to this as ‘protecting your vital interests’ where you may be in a position not to be able to consent.

Law: Sometimes the law obliges us to provide your information to an organisation (see above).

Special categories

The law states that personal information about your health falls into a special category of information because it is very sensitive. Reasons that may entitle us to use and process your information may be as follows:

Public Interest: Where we may need to handle your personal information when it is considered to be in the public interest. For example, when there is an outbreak of a specific disease and we need to contact you for treatment, or we need to pass your information to relevant organisations to ensure you receive advice and/or treatment

Consent: When you have given us consent

Vital Interest: If you are incapable of giving consent, and we have to use your information to protect your vital interests (eg if you have had an accident and you need emergency treatment)

Defending a claim: If we need your information to defend a legal claim against us by you, or by another party

Providing you with medical care: Where we need your information to provide you with medical and healthcare services

GP Connect System and Data Sharing

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) has reviewed the National Data Sharing Arrangement (NDSA) for GP connect. GP Connect helps clinicians gain access to GP patient records during interactions away from a patient’s registered practice and makes their medical information available to appropriate health and social care professionals when and where they need it, to support the patient’s direct care.

From a privacy, confidentiality and data protection perspective, GP Connect provides a method of secure information transfer and reduces the need to use less secure or less efficient methods of transferring information, such as email or telephone.

GP Connect – key points.

• GP Connect can only be used for direct care purposes.
• Individuals can opt out of their GP patient record being shared via GP Connect by contacting their GP practice.
• Access to GP Connect is governed by role-based access control (RBAC) and organisational controls; only people who need to see the GP patient record for a patient’s direct care should be able to see it
• All systems that allow the use of GP Connect must undergo a robust compliance process and the organisations involved must sign a connection agreement holding them to high standards of information security.

GP Connect products can help health and social care professionals share, view or act on information that could be required for a patient’s direct care, but they would otherwise have difficulty accessing easily (for example if they are using different IT systems).

Organisations can have access to relevant information in GP patient records to provide direct care to patients only.

Type of organisations that use GP Connect

Examples of organisations that may wish to use GP connect to view GP patient records include:

• GP surgeries that patients are not registered at – for example, if they need to see a doctor when they are away from home
• secondary care (hospitals) if they need to attend A&E or are having an operation
• GP hubs/primary care networks (PCNs)/integrated care systems (ICSs), partnerships between healthcare providers and local authorities
• local ‘shared care‘ record systems
• ambulance trusts, so paramedics can view GP patient records in an emergency
• healthcare professionals such as community services
• acute and emergency care service providers
• NHS 111
• pharmacies
• optometrists
• dentistry
• mental health trusts
• hospices
• adult and children’s social care
• care and nursing homes

All access to your GP patient record is stored within an audit trail at your GP practice and within the organisation that information has been shared with.

Confidentiality

Confidentiality and trust are essential to the relationship between GPs and their patients.

The information a patient provides to their GP is confidential, and they can expect that any information that is shared for their direct care will remain confidential.

GP Connect relies on ‘implied consent’.

Explicit consent is not required when information is shared for a direct care purpose. If a patient does not want their information to be shared using GP Connect, they can opt out.

The NDSA and its terms and conditions stipulate that any information received or accessed about a patient for direct care purposes must remain confidential.

In addition to the NDSA, health and social care professionals are also subject to their own professional codes of confidentiality and are aware that any information received via GP Connect is provided in confidence, which must be respected.

Organisations using GP Connect are notified of their duty as ‘controllers’ to be fair and transparent about their processing of their patients’ information and to ensure that their transparency notices are fully updated with how they may be using GP Connect functionality.

NHS England helps support the mitigation of information sharing risks by ensuring that:

• NHS England audit data access is subject to two-factor authentication and role-based access controls – only certain assured users can have access to the full audit logs
• a completed Supplier Conformance Assessment List (SCAL) which covers service and capability specific compliance requirements and controls of the consumer system is in place

It is the responsibility of organisations using GP Connect to ensure that they comply with the NDSA, and their statutory and legal obligations regarding data protection and confidentiality.

Opting out of GP Connect

If patients do not wish their information to be shared using GP Connect, they can opt out by contacting their GP practice.

National Data Opt-Out

The National Data Opt-out is a service that allows patients to opt out of their confidential patient information being used for research and planning.

The National Data Opt-out only applies to any disclosure of data for purposes beyond direct care, so having National Data Opt-out will not prevent your GP patient record being shared via GP Connect.

Risk Stratification 

Risk stratification data tools are increasingly being used in the NHS to help determine a person’s risk of suffering a condition, preventing an unplanned or (re)admission and identifying a need for preventive intervention. Information about you is collected from several sources including NHS Trusts and from this GP Practice. The identifying parts of your data are removed, analysis of your data is undertaken, and a risk score is then determined. This is then provided back to your GP as data controller in an identifiable form. Risk stratification enables your GP to focus on preventing ill health and not just the treatment of sickness. If necessary, your GP may be able to offer you additional services. Please note that you have the right to opt out of your data being used in this way in most circumstances, please contact the practice for further information about opt out.

Individual Risk Management at a GP practice level however is deemed to be part of your individual healthcare and is covered by our legal powers above.

Medicines Management

The Practice may conduct Medicines Management Reviews of medications prescribed to its patients. This service performs a review of prescribed medications to ensure patients receive the most appropriate, up to date and cost-effective treatments. The reviews are carried out by the ICBs Medicines Management Team under a Data Processing contract with the Practice.

Transferring the current paper medical records into patients’ electronic medical records.

The following provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation permit us to digitise existing paper medical records:

Article 6(1)(e) – ‘processing is necessary…in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller…’’

Article 9(2)(h) – ‘processing is necessary for the purpose of preventative…medicine…the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services…’

The paper patient records will be shared with [Scanning provider], who will scan and digitise the current paper medical records before destroying them.  The paper patient records will be shared with the scanning provider above, who will scan and digitise the current paper medical records before destroying them.

Anonymised information

Sometimes we may provide information about you in an anonymised form. Such information is used analyse population- level heath issues and helps the NHS to plan better services. If we share information for these purposes, then none of the information will identify you as an individual and cannot be traced back to you.

Research – National Institute for Health & Social Care Research (NIHR) – Clinical Research Network 
Clinical Research Network West Midlands (CRN WM) provides a research delivery service to GP practices across the West Midlands. All CRN WM Delivery Support staff are employed by The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust. All NHS Staff members who have been allocated to work within the Practice will be issued with a Letter of access or assurance to confirm individual study placements and pre-employment checks.

The legal bases for processing this information
CRN WM processes data under the instruction of the individual research protocol, as delegated by the practice (data controller). You can opt out of being invited to participate in research at any time, please inform a member of the practice team and we will add the appropriate opt out code to your record.

Prior to informed consent:
The legal basis which allows us to process your personal data for research is GDPR article 6 (1)(f) …legitimate interests…except where such interests are overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject…’

Once informed consent has been given:
The legal basis which allows us to process your personal data is informed consent – Article 6 1(a) the data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purposes; and Article 9 (2) (a) the data subject has given explicit consent to the processing those personal data for one or more specified purposes.

Individual study consent forms will detail how to withdraw consent and who to contact, this will usually be via the study sponsor.

Categories of personal data
The data processed by CRN WM delivery staff, in addition to demographic and contact details, is likely to be special category information (such as health information) to determine eligibility for individual research studies.

Recipients of data
The data processed by CRN WM delivery staff will be used to invite potentially eligible patients into research studies. Once patients have consented to participate, data processed by the CRN WM delivery staff will be used to answer the research questions as outlined in individual research protocols.

For further information, please refer to the Clinical Research Network West Midlands Privacy Notice: https://local.nihr.ac.uk/documents/crn-wm-privacy-notice-march-2021/27187

Summary Care Records

All patients registered with a GP have a Summary Care Record, unless they have chosen not to have one. The information held in your Summary Care Record gives registered and regulated healthcare professionals, away from your usual GP practice, access to information to provide you with safer care, reduce the risk of prescribing errors and improve your patient experience.

Your Summary Care Record contains basic (Core) information about allergies and medications and any reactions that you have had to medication in the past.

Some patients, including many with long term health conditions, previously have agreed to have Additional Information shared as part of their Summary Care Record. This Additional Information includes information about significant medical history (past and present), reasons for medications, care plan information and immunisations.

Change to information held in your Summary Care Record

In light of the current emergency, the Department of Health and Social Care has removed the requirement for a patient’s prior explicit consent to share Additional Information as part of the Summary Care Record.

This is because the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has issued a legal notice to healthcare bodies requiring them to share confidential patient information with other healthcare bodies where this is required to diagnose, control and prevent the spread of the virus and manage the pandemic. This includes sharing Additional Information through Summary Care Records, unless a patient objects to this.

If you have already expressed a preference to only have Core information shared in your Summary Care Record, or to opt-out completely of having a Summary Care Record, these preferences will continue to be respected and this change will not apply to you. For everyone else, the Summary Care Record will be updated to include the Additional Information. This change of requirement will be reviewed after the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Why we have made this change

In order to look after your health and care needs, health and social care bodies may share your confidential patient information contained in your Summary Care Record with clinical and non-clinical staff in other health and care organisations, for example hospitals, NHS 111 and out of hours organisations. These changes will improve the healthcare that you receive away from your usual GP practice.

Your rights in relation to your Summary Care Record

Regardless of your past decisions about your Summary Care Record preferences, you will still have the same options that you currently have in place to opt out of having a Summary Care Record, including the opportunity to opt-back in to having a Summary Care Record or opt back in to allow sharing of Additional Information.

You can exercise these rights by doing the following:

1. Choose to have a Summary Care Record with all information shared. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see a detailed Summary Care Record, including Core and Additional Information, if they need to provide you with direct care.
2. Choose to have a Summary Care Record with Core information only. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see limited information about allergies and medications in your Summary Care Record if they need to provide you with direct care.
3. Choose to opt-out of having a Summary Care Record altogether. This means that you do not want any information shared with other authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals involved in your direct care. You will not be able to change this preference at the time if you require direct care away from your GP practice. This means that no authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see information held in your GP records if they need to provide you with direct care, including in an emergency.

To make these changes, you should inform your GP practice or complete this form and return it to your GP practice.

Patient Communication

Because we are obliged to protect any confidential information, we hold about you and we take this very seriously, it is imperative that you let us know immediately if you change any of your contact details.

We may contact you using SMS texting to your mobile phone if we need to notify you about appointments and other services that we provide to you involving your direct care, therefore you must ensure that we have your up-to-date details. This is to ensure we are sure we are contacting you and not another person. As this is operated on an ‘opt out’ basis we will assume that you give us permission to contact you via SMS if you have provided us with your mobile telephone number. Please let us know if you wish to opt out of this SMS service. We may also contact you using the email address you have provided to us. Please ensure that we have your up-to-date details.

There may be occasions where authorised research facilities would like you to take part in research. Your contact details may be used to invite you to receive further information about such research opportunities.

The NHS App

We use the NHS Account Messaging Service provided by NHS England to send you messages relating to your health and care. You need to be an NHS App user to receive these messages. Further information about the service can be found at the privacy notice for the NHS App managed by NHS England.

Safeguarding

The Practice is dedicated to ensuring that the principles and duties of safeguarding adults and children are holistically, consistently, and conscientiously applied with the wellbeing of all, at the heart of what we do.

Our legal basis for processing For the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) purposes is: –

Article 6(1)(e) ‘…exercise of official authority…’.

For the processing of special categories data, the basis is: –

Article 9(2)(b) – ‘processing is necessary for the purposes of carrying out the obligations and exercising specific rights of the controller or of the data subject in the field of employment and social security and social protection law…’

Research

Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) collects de-identified patient data from a network of GP practices across the UK. Primary care data are linked to a range of other health related data to provide a longitudinal, representative UK population health dataset.  You can opt out of your information being used for research purposes at any time (see below), full details can be found here: –

https://cprd.com/transparency-information

The legal bases for processing this information

CPRD do not hold or process personal data on patients; however, NHS Digital (formally the Health and Social Care Centre) may process ‘personal data’ for us as an accredited ‘safe haven’ or ‘trusted third-party’ within the NHS when linking GP data with data from other sources. The legal bases for processing this data are:

• Medicines and medical device monitoring: Article 6(e) and Article 9(2)(i) – public interest in the area of public health
• Medical research and statistics: Article 6(e) and Article 9(2)(j) – public interest and scientific research purposes

Any data CPRD hold or pass on to bona fide researchers, except for clinical research studies, will have been anonymised in accordance with the Information Commissioner’s Office Anonymisation Code of Practice. We will hold data indefinitely for the benefit of future research, but studies will normally only hold the data we release to them for twelve months.

Categories of personal data

The data collected by Practice staff in the event of a safeguarding situation will be as much personal information as is possible that is necessary to obtain in order to handle the situation. In addition to some basic demographic and contact details, we will also process details of what the safeguarding concern is. This is likely to be special category information (such as health information).

Sources of the data

The Practice will either receive or collect information when someone contacts the organisation with safeguarding concerns, or we believe there may be safeguarding concerns and make enquiries to relevant providers.

Recipients of personal data

The information is used by the Practice when handling a safeguarding incident or concern. We may share information accordingly to ensure duty of care and investigation as required with other partners such as local authorities, the police or healthcare professionals (i.e. their GP or mental health team).

National Obesity Audit (NOA)

Background: 

More than one in four adults are currently living with obesity. We know obesity puts people at greater risk of many serious diseases and increases their chances of associated comorbidities e.g., cancers, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes.

What is the National Obesity Audit? 

NHS England has established a National Obesity Audit (NOA) to bring together comparable data from the different types of weight management services across England. For the NOA to be successful, linking to primary care patient-level data is a critical part of the project to enable analysis of longitudinal weight change, to inform improvement aims.

How will the NOA benefit patients? 

By linking to GP patient-level data with weight management service data, the NOA will provide information across the weight management pathway to support quality improvements to patient care. For example, equity of access, improving outcomes of weight management services, reducing obesity-related comorbidities, and improving population health.

What information is collected? 

The NOA data collection includes both personal data and special categories of personal data relating to patients living with overweight or obesity, including:

• Demographic information – such as NHS number, date of birth, postcode, sex and ethnicity
• Health information – such as Body Mass Index (BMI), obesity-related co-morbidities, healthcare interventions such as weight loss advice and bariatric surgery.

More information on the data used for the purposes of the NOA is available in the NOA dataset specification

How the NOA will use your data

NOA data will be used for the purposes of informing policy and guidelines for managing obesity across the NHS and local authorities.  It will also be used for benchmarking and to enable NHS providers to maximise the use of their resources and to improve patient outcomes.

NHS England will analyse the data held in the NOA to carry out data quality checks, to pseudonymise the data (de-identify) and to derive values, for example turn date of birth into age.

Data in the NOA may also be linked to other data that NHS England holds, including the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Audit (CVD Prevent) and the Community Services Data Set (CSDS).

NOA data is used to create regular statistical publications on the NHS England website including dashboards and an annual report.  All data published is anonymous and aggregate so that patients cannot be identified from the data.

The data collected for the NOA from the CVD Prevent Audit will not be used for performance management of GPs.

NOA legal basis

Data protection law requires NHS England to have a legal basis before we can use your personal data.

Our legal basis is:

Legal obligation

Article 6(1)(c) of UK GDPR.  This is because the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has issued NHS England with a Direction to analyse this data for NOA purposes. This Direction is called the National Obesity Audit Directions 2023

We also need an additional legal basis in the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) to use data which is extra sensitive. This is known as ‘special categories of personal data’. Our legal basis to use data relating to your health and ethnicity is:

Substantial public interest 

Article 9(2)(g) of UK GDPR, plus Schedule 1, Part 2, Paragraph 6 “statutory etc and government purposes” of DPA 2018

Health or social care

Article 9(2)(h) of UK GDPR, plus Schedule 1, Part 1, Paragraph 2 “Health or social care purposes” of DPA 2018.

The NOA and NHSE will share this data with

We treat the data we hold with great care. All data which is shared by NHS England is subject to robust rules relating to privacy, security and confidentiality and only the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the relevant health and social care purpose will ever be shared.

Data is shared or is expected to be shared with organisations such as healthcare providers, clinicians, and commissioners of NHS services, for example:

• the organisation that provided your care:to assess the effectiveness of your care and to improve the services they offer
• The Department of Health and Social Care:to inform policy and guidelines
• organisations responsible for the commissioning of NHS services in England, such as Integrated Care Boards: to plan and improve weight management services and for benchmarking
• local authorities:to help plan and improve weight management services
• research organisations, including universities and charities:to carry out research

These organisations must apply for access to NOA data through NHS England’s Data Access Request Service.  Each application is assessed very carefully to make sure that the organisation:

• has a legal basis to access the data for that purpose
• will use the data for the benefit of health and care and for the agreed purposes only
• will handle and store the data securely

We only share data which can identify you (identifiable data) if this is absolutely necessary and the organisation who has made an application for data cannot achieve their purpose without it.  Where possible we remove information from the data which identifies you, or we replace it with a unique reference number (this is known as pseudonymisation).

Each organisation we share data with must sign a Data Sharing Framework Contract and a Data Sharing Agreement and we carry out audits to check they are using the data as agreed.

Details about the NOA data we have shared with other organisations, except for anonymous data, will be published in the NHS England Data Uses Register.

Practice Third party processors

To deliver the best possible service, the practice will share data (where required) with other NHS bodies such as other GP practices and hospitals. In addition, the practice will use carefully selected third party service providers. When we use a third-party service provider to process data on our behalf then we will always have an appropriate agreement in place to ensure that they keep the data secure, that they do not use or share information other than in accordance with our instructions and that they are operating appropriately. Examples of functions that may be carried out by third parties include:

• Companies that provide IT services & support, including our core clinical systems; systems which manage patient facing services (such as our website and service accessible through the same); data hosting service providers; systems which facilitate appointment bookings or electronic prescription services; document management services etc.
• Delivery services (for example if we were to arrange for delivery of any medicines to you).
• Payment providers (if for example you were paying for a prescription or a service such as travel vaccinations).

Further details regarding specific third-party processors can be supplied on request to the Data Protection Officer as below.

How do we maintain the confidentiality of your records? 

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will only use information collected lawfully in accordance with:

• Data Protection Act 2018
• The General Data Protection Regulations 2016
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Common Law Duty of Confidentiality
• Health and Social Care Act 2012
• NHS Codes of Confidentiality, Information Security and Records Management
• Information: To Share or Not to Share Review

Every member of staff who works for an NHS organisation has a legal obligation to keep information about you confidential.

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), where the law requires information to be passed on and / or in accordance with the information sharing principle following Dame Fiona Caldicott’s information sharing review (Information to share or not to share) where “The duty to share information can be as important as the duty to protect patient confidentiality.” This means that health and social care professionals should have the confidence to share information in the best interests of their patients within the framework set out by the Caldicott principles.

Our practice policy is to respect the privacy of our patients, their families and our staff and to maintain compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and all UK specific Data Protection Requirements. Our policy is to ensure all personal data related to our patients will be protected.

All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. The practice will, if required, sign a separate confidentiality agreement if the client deems it necessary.  If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

In certain circumstances you may have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of data. Please contact the Data Protection Officer in writing if you wish to withdraw your consent.  If some circumstances, we may need to store your data after your consent has been withdrawn to comply with a legislative requirement.

Some of this information will be held centrally and used for statistical purposes. Where we do this, we take strict measures to ensure that individual patients cannot be identified. Sometimes your information may be requested to be used for research purposes – the surgery will always gain your consent before releasing the information for this purpose in an identifiable format.   In some circumstances you can Opt-out of the surgery sharing any of your information for research purposes.

With your consent we would also like to use your information

There are times that we may want to use your information to contact you or offer you services, not directly about your healthcare, in these instances we will always gain your consent to contact you.  We would however like to use your name, contact details, and email address to inform you of other services that may benefit you.  We will only do this with your consent.  There may be occasions where authorised research facilities would like you to take part on innovations, research, improving services or identifying trends, you will be asked to opt into such programmes if you are happy to do so.

At any stage where we would like to use your data for anything other than the specified purposes and where there is no lawful requirement for us to share or process your data, we will ensure that you have the ability to consent and opt out prior to any data processing taking place.
This information is not shared with third parties or used for any marketing and you can unsubscribe at any time via phone, email or by informing the practice DPO as below.

National Opt-Out Facility

You can choose whether your confidential patient information is used for research and planning.

Who can use your confidential patient information for research and planning?

It is used by the NHS, local authorities, university and hospital researchers, medical colleges and pharmaceutical companies researching new treatments.

Making your data opt-out choice

You can choose to opt out of sharing your confidential patient information for research and planning. There may still be times when your confidential patient information is used: for example, during an epidemic where there might be a risk to you or to other people’s health. You can also still consent to take part in a specific research project.

Will choosing this opt-out affect your care and treatment?

No, your confidential patient information will still be used for your individual care. Choosing to opt out will not affect your care and treatment. You will still be invited for screening services, such as screenings for bowel cancer.

What should you do next?

You do not need to do anything if you are happy about how your confidential patient information is used.

If you do not want your confidential patient information to be used for research and planning, you can choose to opt out securely online or through a telephone service.

You can change your choice at any time. To find out more or to make your choice visit nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters or call 0300 303 5678

NHS Digital Data Collection from the Practice

The NHS needs data about the patients it treats to plan and deliver its services and to ensure that care and treatment provided is safe and effective. The General Practice Data for Planning and Research data collection will help the NHS to improve health and care services for everyone by collecting patient data that can be used to do this. For example, patient data can help the NHS to:

• monitor the long-term safety and effectiveness of care
• plan how to deliver better health and care services
• prevent the spread of infectious diseases
• identify new treatments and medicines through health research

GP practices already share patient data for these purposes, but this new data collection will be more efficient and effective.

This means that GPs can get on with looking after their patients, and NHS Digital can provide controlled access to patient data to the NHS and other organisations who need to use it, to improve health and care for everyone.

Contributing to research projects will benefit us all as better and safer treatments are introduced more quickly and effectively without compromising your privacy and confidentiality.

NHS Digital has engaged with the British Medical Association (BMA), Royal College of GPs (RCGP) and the National Data Guardian (NDG) to ensure relevant safeguards are in place for patients and GP practices.

NHS Digital purposes for processing patient data

Patient data from GP medical records kept by GP practices in England is used every day to improve health, care and services through planning and research, helping to find better treatments and improve patient care. The NHS is introducing an improved way to share this information – called the General Practice Data for Planning and Research data collection.

NHS Digital will collect, analyse, publish, and share this patient data to improve health and care services for everyone. This includes:

• informing and developing health and social care policy
• planning and commissioning health and care services
• taking steps to protect public health (including managing and monitoring the coronavirus pandemic)
• in exceptional circumstances, providing you with individual care
• enabling healthcare and scientific research

Any data that NHS Digital collects will only be used for health and care purposes. It is never shared with marketing or insurance companies.

What patient data NHS Digital collect

Patient data will be collected from GP medical records about:

• any living patient registered at a GP practice in England when the collection started – this includes children and adults
• any patient who died after the data collection started, and was previously registered at a GP practice in England when the data collection started

While 1 September has been seen by some as a cut-off date for opt-out, after which data extraction would begin, Government has stated this will not be the case and data extraction will not commence until NHS Digital have met the tests.

The NHS is introducing three changes to the opt-out system which mean that patients will be able to change their opt-out status at any time:

• Patients do not need to register a Type 1 opt-out by 1 September to ensure their GP data will not be uploaded
• NHS Digital will create the technical means to allow GP data that has previously been uploaded to the system via the GPDPR collection to be deleted when someone registers a Type 1 opt-out
• The plan to retire Type 1 opt-outs will be deferred for at least 12 months while we get the new arrangements up and running, and will not be implemented without consultation with the RCGP, the BMA and the National Data Guardian

We will not collect your name or where you live. Any other data that could directly identify you, for example NHS number, General Practice Local Patient Number, full postcode and date of birth, is replaced with unique codes which are produced by de-identification software before the data is shared with NHS Digital.

This process is called pseudonymisation and means that no one will be able to directly identify you in the data. The diagram below helps to explain what this means. Using the terms in the diagram, the data we collect would be described as de-personalised.

Image provided by Understanding Patient Data under licence.

NHS Digital will be able to use the same software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason. Only NHS Digital has the ability to do this. This would mean that the data became personally identifiable data in the diagram above. An example would be where you consent to your identifiable data being shared with a research project or clinical trial in which you are participating, as they need to know the data is about you.

More information about when we may be able to re-identify the data is in the who we share your patient data with section below.

The NHS Digital programme will be providing further information as the programme progresses. In the meantime, if you have any questions, you can contact the programme at [email protected].

The NHS Digital web pages also provide further information at https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/data-collections-and-data-sets/data-collections/general-practice-data-for-planning-and-research#additional-information-for-gp-practices.

The Data NHD Digital collect

We will only collect structured and coded data from patient medical records that is needed for specific health and social care purposes explained above.

Data that directly identifies you as an individual patient, including your NHS number, General Practice Local Patient Number, full postcode, date of birth and if relevant date of death, is replaced with unique codes produced by de-identification software before it is sent to NHS Digital. This means that no one will be able to directly identify you in the data.

NHS Digital will be able to use the software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason. This would mean that the data became personally identifiable in the diagram above. It will still be held securely and protected, including when it is shared by NHS Digital.

NHS Digital will collect

• data on your sex, ethnicity and sexual orientation
• clinical codes and data about diagnoses, symptoms, observations, test results, medications, allergies, immunisations, referrals and recalls, and appointments, including information about your physical, mental and sexual health
• data about staff who have treated you

More detailed information about the patient data we collect is contained in the Data Provision Notice issued to GP practices.

NHS Digital Does not collect.

• your name and address (except for your postcode in unique coded form)
• written notes (free text), such as the details of conversations with doctors and nurses
• images, letters and documents
• coded data that is not needed due to its age – for example medication, referral and appointment data that is over 10 years old
• coded data that GPs are not permitted to share by law – for example certain codes about IVF treatment, and certain information about gender re-assignment

Opting out of NHS Digital collecting your data (Type 1 Opt-out)

If you do not want your identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) to be shared outside of your GP practice for purposes except for your own care, you can register an opt-out with your GP practice. This is known as a Type 1 Opt-out.

Type 1 Opt-outs were introduced in 2013 for data sharing from GP practices but may be discontinued in the future as a new opt-out has since been introduced to cover the broader health and care system, called the National Data Opt-out. If this happens people who have registered a Type 1 Opt-out will be informed. More about National Data Opt-outs is in the section Who we share patient data with.

NHS Digital will not collect any patient data for patients who have already registered a Type 1 Opt-out in line with current policy. If this changes patients who have registered a Type 1 Opt-out will be informed.

If you do not want your patient data shared with NHS Digital, you can register a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice. You can register a Type 1 Opt-out at any time. You can also change your mind at any time and withdraw a Type 1 Opt-out.

Data sharing with NHS Digital will start on 1 September 2021.

If you have already registered a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice your data will not be shared with NHS Digital.

If you wish to register a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice before data sharing starts with NHS Digital, this should be done by returning this form to your GP practice. If you have previously registered a Type 1 Opt-out and you would like to withdraw this, you can also use the form to do this. You can send the form by post or email to your GP practice or call 0300 3035678 for a form to be sent out to you.

If you register a Type 1 Opt-out after your patient data has already been shared with NHS Digital, no more of your data will be shared with NHS Digital. NHS Digital will however still hold the patient data which was shared with us before you registered the Type 1 Opt-out.

If you do not want NHS Digital to share your identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) with anyone else for purposes beyond your own care, then you can also register a National Data Opt-out. There is more about National Data Opt-outs and when they apply in the National Data Opt-out section below.

NHS Digital legal basis for collecting, analysing, and sharing patient data.

When we collect, analyse, publish, and share patient data, there are strict laws in place that we must follow. Under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), this includes explaining to you what legal provisions apply under GDPR that allows us to process patient data. The GDPR protects everyone’s data.

NHS Digital has been directed by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care under the General Practice Data for Planning and Research Directions 2021 to collect and analyse data from GP practices for health and social care purposes including policy, planning, commissioning, public health and research purposes.

NHS Digital is the controller of the patient data collected and analysed under the GDPR jointly with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.

All GP practices in England are legally required to share data with NHS Digital for this purpose under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 (2012 Act). More information about this requirement is contained in the Data Provision Notice issued by NHS Digital to GP practices.

NHS Digital has various powers to publish anonymous statistical data and to share patient data under sections 260 and 261 of the 2012 Act. It also has powers to share data under other Acts, for example the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007.

Regulation 3 of the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002 (COPI) also allow confidential patient information to be used and shared appropriately and lawfully in a public health emergency. The Secretary of State has issued legal notices under COPI (COPI Notices) requiring NHS Digital, NHS England and Improvement, arm’s-length bodies (such as Public Health England), local authorities, NHS trusts, Integrated Care Boards and GP practices to share confidential patient information to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak. Any information used or shared during the COVID-19 outbreak will be limited to the period of the outbreak unless there is another legal basis to use confidential patient information.

The legal basis under UKGDPR for General Practice Data for Planning and Research

How NHS Digital use patient data

NHS Digital will analyse and link the patient data we collect with other patient data we hold to create national data sets and for data quality purposes.

NHS Digital will be able to use the de-identification software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances for these purposes, where this is necessary and where there is a valid legal reason. There are strict internal approvals which need to be in place before we can do this and this will be subject to independent scrutiny and oversight by the Independent Group Advising on the Release of Data (IGARD).

These national data sets are analysed and used by NHS Digital to produce national statistics and management information, including public dashboards about health and social care which are published. We never publish any patient data that could identify you. All data we publish is anonymous statistical data.

For more information about data, we publish see Data and Information and Data Dashboards.

We may also carry out analysis on national data sets for data quality purposes and to support the work of others for the purposes set out in Our purposes for processing patient data section above.

Who NHS Digital share patient data with

All data which is shared by NHS Digital is subject to robust rules relating to privacy, security, and confidentiality and only the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the relevant health and social care purpose will be shared.

All requests to access patient data from this collection, other than anonymous aggregate statistical data, will be assessed by NHS Digital’s Data Access Request Service, to make sure that organisations have a legal basis to use the data and that it will be used safely, securely and appropriately.

These requests for access to patient data will also be subject to independent scrutiny and oversight by the Independent Group Advising on the Release of Data (IGARD). Organisations approved to use this data will be required to enter into a data sharing agreement with NHS Digital regulating the use of the data.

There are several organisations who are likely to need access to different elements of patient data from the General Practice Data for Planning and Research collection. These include but may not be limited to:

• the Department of Health and Social Care and its executive agencies, including Public Health England and other government departments
• NHS England and NHS Improvement
• primary care networks (PCNs), Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) and integrated care organisations (ICOs)
• local authorities
• research organisations, including universities, charities, clinical research organisations that run clinical trials and pharmaceutical companies

If the request is approved, the data will either be made available within a secure data access environment within NHS Digital infrastructure, or where the needs of the recipient cannot be met this way, as a direct dissemination of data. We plan to reduce the amount of data being processed outside central, secure data environments and increase the data we make available to be accessed via our secure data access environment. For more information read about improved data access in improving our data processing services.

Data will always be shared in the uniquely coded form (de-personalised data in the diagram above) unless in the circumstances of any specific request it is necessary for it to be provided in an identifiable form (personally identifiable data in the diagram above). For example, when express patient consent has been given to a researcher to link patient data from the General Practice for Planning and Research collection to data the researcher has already obtained from the patient.

It is therefore possible for NHS Digital to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason which permits this without breaching the common law duty of confidentiality. This would include:

• where the data was needed by a health professional for your own care and treatment
• where you have expressly consented to this, for example to participate in a clinical trial
• where there is a legal obligation, for example where the COPI Notices apply – see Our legal basis for collecting, analysing and sharing patient data above for more information on this
• where approval has been provided by the Health Research Authority or the Secretary of State with support from the Confidentiality Advisory Group (CAG) under Regulation 5 of the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002 (COPI) – this is sometimes known as a ‘section 251 approval’

This would mean that the data was personally identifiable in the diagram above. Re-identification of the data would only take place following approval of the specific request through the Data Access Request Service, and subject to independent assurance by IGARD and consultation with the Professional Advisory Group, which is made up of representatives from the BMA and the RCGP. If you have registered a National Data Opt-out, this would be applied in accordance with the National Data Opt-out policy before any identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) about you was shared. More about the National Data Opt-out is in the section below.

Details of who we have shared data with, in what form and for what purposes are published on our data release register.

The practice is one of many organisations working in the health and care system to improve care for patients and the public.

Whenever you use a health or care service, such as attending Accident & Emergency or using Community Care services, important information about you is collected in a patient record for that service. Collecting this information helps to ensure you get the best possible care and treatment.

The information collected about you when you use these services can also be used and provided to other organisations for purposes beyond your individual care, for instance to help with:

• improving the quality and standards of care provided
• research into the development of new treatments
• preventing illness and diseases
• monitoring safety
• planning services

This may only take place when there is a clear legal basis to use this information. All these uses help to provide better health and care for you, your family and future generations. Confidential patient information about your health and care is only used like this where allowed by law.

Most of the time, anonymised data is used for research and planning so that you cannot be identified in which case your confidential patient information isn’t needed.

You have a choice about whether you want your confidential patient information to be used in this way. If you are happy with this use of information you do not need to do anything. If you do choose to opt out your confidential patient information will still be used to support your individual care.

To find out more or to register your choice to opt out, please visit www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters.  On this web page you will:

• See what is meant by confidential patient information
• Find examples of when confidential patient information is used for individual care and examples of when it is used for purposes beyond individual care
• Find out more about the benefits of sharing data
• Understand more about who uses the data
• Find out how your data is protected
• Be able to access the system to view, set or change your opt-out setting
• Find the contact telephone number if you want to know any more or to set/change your opt-out by phone
• See the situations where the opt-out will not apply

You can also find out more about how patient information is used at:

https://www.hra.nhs.uk/information-about-patients/ (which covers health and care research); and

https://understandingpatientdata.org.uk/what-you-need-know (which covers how and why patient information is used, the safeguards and how decisions are made)

You can change your mind about your choice at any time.

Data being used or shared for purposes beyond individual care does not include your data being shared with insurance companies or used for marketing purposes and data would only be used in this way with your specific agreement.

Health and care organisations have until 2020 to put systems and processes in place so they can be compliant with the national data opt-out and apply your choice to any confidential patient information they use or share for purposes beyond your individual care. Our organisation ‘is / is not currently’ compliant with the national data opt-out policy.

Where do we store your information electronically?

All the personal data we process is processed by our staff in the UK however for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance this information may be located on servers within the European Union.

No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so and appropriate safeguards have been put in place such as a Data Processor as above).  We have a Data Protection regime in place to oversee the effective and secure processing of your personal and or special category (sensitive, confidential) data.

EMIS Web

The Practice uses a clinical system provided by a Data Processor called EMIS, from 10^th June 2019, EMIS started storing your practice’s EMIS Web data in a highly secure, third-party cloud hosted environment, namely Amazon Web Services (“AWS”).

The data will remain in the UK at all times and will be fully encrypted both in transit and at rest. In doing this, there will be no change to the control of access to your data and the hosted service provider will not have any access to the decryption keys. AWS is one of the world’s largest cloud companies, already supporting numerous public sector clients (including the NHS), and it offers the very highest levels of security and support.

Who are our partner organisations?

We may also have to share your information, subject to strict agreements on how it will be used, with the following organisations.

• NHS Trusts / Foundation Trusts
• GP’s
• Primary Care Network
• NHS Commissioning Support Units
• Independent Contractors such as dentists, opticians, pharmacists
• Private Sector Providers
• Voluntary Sector Providers
• Ambulance Trusts
• Integrated Care Boards
• Social Care Services
• NHS England (NHSE) and NHS Digital (NHSD)
• Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH)
• Local Authorities
• Education Services
• Fire and Rescue Services
• Police & Judicial Services
• Voluntary Sector Providers
• Private Sector Providers
• Other ‘data processors’ which you will be informed of

You will be informed who your data will be shared with and in some cases asked for consent for this to happen when this is required.

Computer System

This practice operates a Clinical Computer System on which NHS Staff record information securely.  This information can then be shared with other clinicians so that everyone caring for you is fully informed about your medical history, including allergies and medication.

To provide around the clock safe care, unless you have asked us not to, we will make information available to our Partner Organisation (above).  Wherever possible, their staff will ask your consent before your information is viewed.

Shared Care Records

To support your care and improve the sharing of relevant information to our partner organisations (as above) when they are involved in looking after you, we will share information to other systems.  You can opt out of this sharing of your records with our partners at anytime if this sharing is based on your consent.

We may also use external companies to process personal information, such as for archiving purposes. These companies are bound by contractual agreements to ensure information is kept confidential and secure.  All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

Sharing your information without consent

We will normally ask you for your consent, but there are times when we may be required by law to share your information without your consent, for example:

• where there is a serious risk of harm or abuse to you or other people;
• Safeguarding matters and investigations
• where a serious crime, such as assault, is being investigated or where it could be prevented;
• notification of new births;
• where we encounter infectious diseases that may endanger the safety of others, such as meningitis or measles (but not HIV/AIDS);
• where a formal court order has been issued;
• where there is a legal requirement, for example if you had committed a Road Traffic Offence.

How long will we store your information?

We are required under UK law to keep your information and data for the full retention periods as specified by the NHS Records management code of practice for health and social care and national archives requirements.

More information on records retention can be found online at (https://digital.nhs.uk/article/1202/Records-Management-Code-of-Practice-for-Health-and-Social-Care-2016).

How can you access, amend move the personal data that you have given to us?

Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise.

Right to object: If we are using your data and you do not agree, you have the right to object. We will respond to your request within one month (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases). This is NOT an absolute right sometimes we will need to process your data even if you object.

Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example for a research project, or consent to send you information about us or matters you may be interested in), you may withdraw your consent at any time.

Right to erasure: In certain situations (for example, where we have processed your data unlawfully), you have the right to request us to “erase” your personal data. We will respond to your request within one month (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases) and will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply. If we do agree to your request, we will delete your data but will need to keep a note of your name/ other basic details on our register of individuals who would prefer not to be contacted. This enables us to avoid contacting you in the future where your data are collected in unconnected circumstances. If you would prefer us not to do this, you are free to say so.

Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your data from us to another data controller. We will help with this with a GP to GP data transfer and transfer of your hard copy notes.

Primary Care Network

The objective of primary care networks (PCNs) is for group practices together to create more collaborative workforces which ease the pressure of GP’s, leaving them better able to focus on patient care.  This practice is a member of the Walsall South 2 PCN.  Other members of the network are Palfrey Health Centre and St Peters Surgery.

Primary Care Networks form a key building block of the NHS long-term plan. Bringing general practices together to work at scale has been a policy priority for some years for a range of reasons, including improving the ability of practices to recruit and retain staff; to manage financial and estates pressures; to provide a wider range of services to patients and to more easily integrate with the wider health and care system.

This means the practice may share your information with other practices within the PCN to provide you with your care and treatment.

Service Evaluation

The PCN carries out service evaluations in order to improve the quality and accessibility of primary care services. This may be carried out in a number of ways including telephone surveys, online surveys and interviews.

The legal basis for contacting you to take part –

Article 6, e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller;”

Article 9, (h) processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems

To process the survey information, we collect from you we will only do so with your consent.

Article 6(1)(a)  – Consent of the data subject (you)

Article 9(2)(a) – Explicit consent of the data subject. (you)’

Population Health Management

Population Health Management (or PHM for short) is aimed at improving the health of an entire population.  It is being implemented across the NHS and this Practice is taking part in a project as a time limited pilot across named practices in Derby and Derbyshire.

The PHM approach requires health care organisations to work together with communities and partner agencies, for example, GP practices, community service providers, hospitals and other health and social care providers.   These organisations will share and combine information with each other in order to get a view of health and services for the population in a particular area. This information sharing is subject to robust security arrangements.

As part of this programme, personal data about your health care will have all identifiers removed (like your name or NHS Number) and replaced with a code which will be linked to information about care received in different health care settings.  If we see that an individual might benefit from some additional care or support, we will send the information back to your GP or hospital provider and they will use the code to identify you and offer you relevant services.

As part of this programme your GP and other care providers will send the information they hold on their systems to the North Of England Commissioning Support Unit (NECS).  NECS are part of NHS England. More information can be found here https://www.necsu.nhs.uk

NECS will link all the information together. Your GP and other care providers will then review this information and make decisions about the whole population or particular patients that might need additional support.  NECS work in partnership with a company called Optum to help them with this work.  Both NECS and Optum are legally obliged to protect your information and maintain confidentiality in the same way that your GP or hospital provider is. More information about Optum can be found here www.optum.co.uk.

Health and Social Care Providers are permitted by data protection law to use personal information where it is ‘necessary for medical purposes’. This includes caring for you directly as well as management of health services more generally.

The PHM project is time-limited to 22 weeks.  Once the project has completed all de-identified , information processed by NECS / Optum will be securely destroyed.  This will not affect any personal information held by your GP or other health or social care providers.

Access to your personal information 

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You have a right under the Data Protection legislation to request access to view or to obtain copies of what information the surgery holds about you and to have it amended should it be inaccurate. To request this, you need to do the following:

• Your request should be made to the Practice. (For information from a hospital or other Trust/ NHS organisation you should write direct to them.
• There is no charge to have a copy of the information held about you
• We are required to provide you with information within one month
• You will need to give adequate information (for example full name, address, date of birth, NHS number and details of your request) so that your identity can be verified, and your records located information we hold about you at any time.

What should you do if your personal information changes?

You should tell us so that we can update our records please contact the Practice Manager as soon as any of your details change, this is especially important for changes of address or contact details (such as your mobile phone number), the practice will from time to time ask you to confirm that the information we currently hold is accurate and up-to-date.

Online Access

You may ask us if you wish to have online access to your medical record. However, there will be certain protocols that we have to follow to give you online access, including written consent and the production of documents that prove your identity.

Please note that when we give you online access, the responsibility is yours to make sure that you keep your information safe and secure if you do not wish any third party to gain access.

Third parties mentioned on your medical record

Sometimes we record information about third parties mentioned by you to us during any consultation, or contained in letters we receive from other organisations. We are under an obligation to make sure we also protect that third party’s rights as an individual and to ensure that references to them which may breach their rights to confidentiality, are removed before we send any information to any other party including yourself.

The NHS wants to give people better ways to see their personal health information online. We know that people want to be able to access their health records. It can help you see test results faster. It also lets you read and review notes from your appointments in your own time.

From 01/11/2022 patients can see all the information within their health record upon request and following activation by their surgery. If you are over 16 and have an online account, such as through the NHS App, NHS website, or another online primary care service, you will, following activation by your surgery, be able to see all future notes and health records from your doctor (GP).

This means that you will be able to see notes from your appointments, as well as test results and any letters that are saved on your records. This only applies to records from your doctor (GP), not from hospitals or other specialists. You will only be able to see information the date your application is processed by the surgery.

Your doctor (GP) may talk to you to discuss test results before you are able to see some of your information on the app. Your doctor (GP) may also talk to you before your full records access is given to make sure that having access is of benefit to you. There might be some sensitive information on your record, so you should talk to your doctor if you have any concerns.

These changes only apply to people with online accounts. If you do not want an online account, you can still access your health records by requesting this information through reception. The changes also only apply to personal information about you. If you are a carer and would like to see information about someone you care for, speak to reception staff.

The NHS App, website and other online services are all very secure, so no one is able to access your information except you. You’ll need to make sure you protect your login details. Don’t share your password with anyone as they will then have access to your personal information.

If you do not want to see your health record, or if you would like more information about these changes, please speak to your GP or reception staff.

Our website

The only website this Privacy Notice applies to is the Surgery’s website. If you use a link to any other website from the Surgery’s website then you will need to read their respective Privacy Notice. We take no responsibility (legal or otherwise) for the content of other websites.

The Surgery’s website uses cookies. For more information on which cookies we use and how we use them, please see our Cookies Policy.

Telephone system

Our telephone system records all telephone calls.  Recordings are retained for up to three years (dependant on storage capacity), and are used periodically for the purposes of seeking clarification where there is a dispute as to what was said and for staff training Access to these recordings is restricted to named senior staff.

Video Consultations

The practice may use video consultations to see patients who may not need to attend the surgery in person, all such systems are NHS security checked and authorised, the practice has a video consultation policy and the statutory powers to process your data via this method of communication, are as above for direct care.

Medical Examiner Service

Following the death of any patients of [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) we are now obliged to inform Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust, Medical Examiner Service.

Medical examiner offices at acute trusts now provide independent scrutiny of non-coronial deaths occurring in acute hospitals.  The role of these offices is now being extended to also cover deaths occurring in the community.

Medical examiner offices are led by medical examiners, senior doctors from a range of specialties including general practice, who provide independent scrutiny of deaths not taken at the outset for coroner investigation. They put the bereaved at the centre of processes after the death of a patient, by giving families and next of kin an opportunity to ask questions and raise concerns. Medical examiners carry out a proportionate review of medical records, and liaise with doctors completing the Medical Certificate of Cause of Death (MCCD).

The Practice will share any patient with the service upon request.

Objections / Complaints

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed at the GP, please contact the GP Practice Manager or the Data Protection Officer as above. If you are still unhappy following a review by the GP practice, you have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe house, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 01625 545745

https://ico.org.uk/

If you are happy for your data to be used for the purposes described in this privacy notice, then you do not need to do anything.  If you have any concerns about how your data is shared, then please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

If you would like to know more about your rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as below.

Data Protection Officer:

The Practice Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey of PCIG Consulting Limited. Any queries regarding Data Protection issues should be addressed to him at: –

Email:   [email protected]

Postal: PCIG Consulting Limited, 7 Westacre Drive, Quarry Bank, Dudley, West Midlands, DY5 2EE

Changes:

It is important to point out that we may amend this Privacy Notice from time to time.  If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of our Privacy Notice, please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

Data Protection Privacy Notice for Patients

Introduction:

This privacy notice lets you know what happens to any personal data that you give to us, or any information that we may collect from you or about you from other organisations.

This privacy notice applies to personal information processed by or on behalf of the practice.

This Notice explains

• Who we are and how we use your information
• Information about our Data Protection Officer
• What kinds of personal information about you we hold and use (process)
• The legal grounds for our processing of your personal information (including when we share it with others)
• What should you do if your personal information changes?
• For how long your personal information is retained / stored by us?
• What are your rights under Data Protection laws

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UKGDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) became law on 25th May 2018, and 1^st January 2021 when the UK exited the EU.

For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (UK) 2016/679) (the “UKGDPR”), and the Data Protection Act 2018 the practice responsible for your personal data is Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

This Notice describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights.

How we use your information and the law.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will be what’s known as the ‘Controller’ of your personal data.

We collect basic personal data about you and location-based information.  This does include name, address and contact details such as email and mobile number etc.

We will also collect sensitive confidential data known as “special category personal data”, in the form of health information, religious belief (if required in a healthcare setting) ethnicity and sex life information that are linked to your healthcare, we may also receive this information about you from other health providers or third parties.

Why do we need your information?

The health care professionals who provide you with care maintain records about your health and any treatment or care you have received previously.  These records help to provide you with the best possible healthcare and treatment.

NHS health records may be electronic, paper-based or a mixture of both.  We use a combination of working practices and technology to ensure that your information is kept confidential and secure.

Records about you may include the following information;

• Details about you, such as your address, your carer or legal representative and emergency contact details.
• Any contact the surgery has had with you, such as appointments, clinic visits, emergency appointments.
• Notes and reports about your health.
• Details about your treatment and care.
• Results of investigations such as laboratory tests, x-rays etc.
• Relevant information from other health professionals, relatives or those who care for you.
• Contact details (including email address, mobile telephone number and home telephone number)

To ensure you receive the best possible care, your records are used to facilitate the care you receive, including contacting you. Information held about you may be used to help protect the health of the public and to help us manage the NHS and the services we provide. Limited information may be used within the GP practice for clinical audit to monitor the quality of the service we provided.

How do we lawfully use your data?

We need your personal, sensitive and confidential data in order to provide you with healthcare services as a General Practice, under the General Data Protection Regulation we will be lawfully using your information in accordance with: –

Article 6, e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller;”

Article 9, (h) processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems

This Privacy Notice applies to the personal data of our patients and the data you have given us about your carers/family members.

We use your personal and healthcare information in the following ways:

• when we need to speak to or contact other doctors, consultants, nurses or any other medical/healthcare professional or organisation during your diagnosis or treatment or ongoing healthcare; this includes the use of telephone or video consultation.
• when we are required by law to hand over your information to any other organisation, such as the police, by court order, solicitors, or immigration enforcement.
• In a de-identified form to support planning of health services and to improve health outcomes for our population

We will never pass on your personal information to anyone else who does not need it, or has no right to it, unless you give us consent to do so.

Legal justification for collecting and using your information

The law says we need a legal basis to handle your personal and healthcare information.

Contract: We have a contract with NHS England to deliver healthcare services to you. This contract provides that we are under a legal obligation to ensure that we deliver medical and healthcare services to the public.

Consent: Sometimes we also rely on the fact that you give us consent to use your personal and healthcare information so that we can take care of your healthcare needs.

Please note that you have the right to withdraw consent at any time if you no longer wish to receive services from us.

Necessary care: Providing you with the appropriate healthcare, where necessary. The Law refers to this as ‘protecting your vital interests’ where you may be in a position not to be able to consent.

Law: Sometimes the law obliges us to provide your information to an organisation (see above).

Special categories

The law states that personal information about your health falls into a special category of information because it is very sensitive. Reasons that may entitle us to use and process your information may be as follows:

Public Interest: Where we may need to handle your personal information when it is considered to be in the public interest. For example, when there is an outbreak of a specific disease and we need to contact you for treatment, or we need to pass your information to relevant organisations to ensure you receive advice and/or treatment

Consent: When you have given us consent

Vital Interest: If you are incapable of giving consent, and we have to use your information to protect your vital interests (eg if you have had an accident and you need emergency treatment)

Defending a claim: If we need your information to defend a legal claim against us by you, or by another party

Providing you with medical care: Where we need your information to provide you with medical and healthcare services

GP Connect System and Data Sharing

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) has reviewed the National Data Sharing Arrangement (NDSA) for GP connect. GP Connect helps clinicians gain access to GP patient records during interactions away from a patient’s registered practice and makes their medical information available to appropriate health and social care professionals when and where they need it, to support the patient’s direct care.

From a privacy, confidentiality and data protection perspective, GP Connect provides a method of secure information transfer and reduces the need to use less secure or less efficient methods of transferring information, such as email or telephone.

GP Connect – key points.

• GP Connect can only be used for direct care purposes.
• Individuals can opt out of their GP patient record being shared via GP Connect by contacting their GP practice.
• Access to GP Connect is governed by role-based access control (RBAC) and organisational controls; only people who need to see the GP patient record for a patient’s direct care should be able to see it
• All systems that allow the use of GP Connect must undergo a robust compliance process and the organisations involved must sign a connection agreement holding them to high standards of information security.

GP Connect products can help health and social care professionals share, view or act on information that could be required for a patient’s direct care, but they would otherwise have difficulty accessing easily (for example if they are using different IT systems).

Organisations can have access to relevant information in GP patient records to provide direct care to patients only.

Type of organisations that use GP Connect

Examples of organisations that may wish to use GP connect to view GP patient records include:

• GP surgeries that patients are not registered at – for example, if they need to see a doctor when they are away from home
• secondary care (hospitals) if they need to attend A&E or are having an operation
• GP hubs/primary care networks (PCNs)/integrated care systems (ICSs), partnerships between healthcare providers and local authorities
• local ‘shared care‘ record systems
• ambulance trusts, so paramedics can view GP patient records in an emergency
• healthcare professionals such as community services
• acute and emergency care service providers
• NHS 111
• pharmacies
• optometrists
• dentistry
• mental health trusts
• hospices
• adult and children’s social care
• care and nursing homes

All access to your GP patient record is stored within an audit trail at your GP practice and within the organisation that information has been shared with.

Confidentiality

Confidentiality and trust are essential to the relationship between GPs and their patients.

The information a patient provides to their GP is confidential, and they can expect that any information that is shared for their direct care will remain confidential.

GP Connect relies on ‘implied consent’.

Explicit consent is not required when information is shared for a direct care purpose. If a patient does not want their information to be shared using GP Connect, they can opt out.

The NDSA and its terms and conditions stipulate that any information received or accessed about a patient for direct care purposes must remain confidential.

In addition to the NDSA, health and social care professionals are also subject to their own professional codes of confidentiality and are aware that any information received via GP Connect is provided in confidence, which must be respected.

Organisations using GP Connect are notified of their duty as ‘controllers’ to be fair and transparent about their processing of their patients’ information and to ensure that their transparency notices are fully updated with how they may be using GP Connect functionality.

NHS England helps support the mitigation of information sharing risks by ensuring that:

• NHS England audit data access is subject to two-factor authentication and role-based access controls – only certain assured users can have access to the full audit logs
• a completed Supplier Conformance Assessment List (SCAL) which covers service and capability specific compliance requirements and controls of the consumer system is in place

It is the responsibility of organisations using GP Connect to ensure that they comply with the NDSA, and their statutory and legal obligations regarding data protection and confidentiality.

Opting out of GP Connect

If patients do not wish their information to be shared using GP Connect, they can opt out by contacting their GP practice.

National Data Opt-Out

The National Data Opt-out is a service that allows patients to opt out of their confidential patient information being used for research and planning.

The National Data Opt-out only applies to any disclosure of data for purposes beyond direct care, so having National Data Opt-out will not prevent your GP patient record being shared via GP Connect.

Risk Stratification 

Risk stratification data tools are increasingly being used in the NHS to help determine a person’s risk of suffering a condition, preventing an unplanned or (re)admission and identifying a need for preventive intervention. Information about you is collected from several sources including NHS Trusts and from this GP Practice. The identifying parts of your data are removed, analysis of your data is undertaken, and a risk score is then determined. This is then provided back to your GP as data controller in an identifiable form. Risk stratification enables your GP to focus on preventing ill health and not just the treatment of sickness. If necessary, your GP may be able to offer you additional services. Please note that you have the right to opt out of your data being used in this way in most circumstances, please contact the practice for further information about opt out.

Individual Risk Management at a GP practice level however is deemed to be part of your individual healthcare and is covered by our legal powers above.

Medicines Management

The Practice may conduct Medicines Management Reviews of medications prescribed to its patients. This service performs a review of prescribed medications to ensure patients receive the most appropriate, up to date and cost-effective treatments. The reviews are carried out by the ICBs Medicines Management Team under a Data Processing contract with the Practice.

Transferring the current paper medical records into patients’ electronic medical records.

The following provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation permit us to digitise existing paper medical records:

Article 6(1)(e) – ‘processing is necessary…in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller…’’

Article 9(2)(h) – ‘processing is necessary for the purpose of preventative…medicine…the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services…’

The paper patient records will be shared with [Scanning provider], who will scan and digitise the current paper medical records before destroying them.  The paper patient records will be shared with the scanning provider above, who will scan and digitise the current paper medical records before destroying them.

Anonymised information

Sometimes we may provide information about you in an anonymised form. Such information is used analyse population- level heath issues and helps the NHS to plan better services. If we share information for these purposes, then none of the information will identify you as an individual and cannot be traced back to you.

Research – National Institute for Health & Social Care Research (NIHR) – Clinical Research Network 
Clinical Research Network West Midlands (CRN WM) provides a research delivery service to GP practices across the West Midlands. All CRN WM Delivery Support staff are employed by The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust. All NHS Staff members who have been allocated to work within the Practice will be issued with a Letter of access or assurance to confirm individual study placements and pre-employment checks.

The legal bases for processing this information

CRN WM processes data under the instruction of the individual research protocol, as delegated by the practice (data controller). You can opt out of being invited to participate in research at any time, please inform a member of the practice team and we will add the appropriate opt out code to your record.

Prior to informed consent:
The legal basis which allows us to process your personal data for research is GDPR article 6 (1)(f) …legitimate interests…except where such interests are overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject…’

Once informed consent has been given:
The legal basis which allows us to process your personal data is informed consent – Article 6 1(a) the data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purposes; and Article 9 (2) (a) the data subject has given explicit consent to the processing those personal data for one or more specified purposes.

Individual study consent forms will detail how to withdraw consent and who to contact, this will usually be via the study sponsor.

Categories of personal data

The data processed by CRN WM delivery staff, in addition to demographic and contact details, is likely to be special category information (such as health information) to determine eligibility for individual research studies.

Recipients of data

The data processed by CRN WM delivery staff will be used to invite potentially eligible patients into research studies. Once patients have consented to participate, data processed by the CRN WM delivery staff will be used to answer the research questions as outlined in individual research protocols.

For further information, please refer to the Clinical Research Network West Midlands Privacy Notice: https://local.nihr.ac.uk/documents/crn-wm-privacy-notice-march-2021/27187

Summary Care Records

All patients registered with a GP have a Summary Care Record, unless they have chosen not to have one. The information held in your Summary Care Record gives registered and regulated healthcare professionals, away from your usual GP practice, access to information to provide you with safer care, reduce the risk of prescribing errors and improve your patient experience.

Your Summary Care Record contains basic (Core) information about allergies and medications and any reactions that you have had to medication in the past.

Some patients, including many with long term health conditions, previously have agreed to have Additional Information shared as part of their Summary Care Record. This Additional Information includes information about significant medical history (past and present), reasons for medications, care plan information and immunisations.

Change to information held in your Summary Care Record

In light of the current emergency, the Department of Health and Social Care has removed the requirement for a patient’s prior explicit consent to share Additional Information as part of the Summary Care Record.

This is because the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has issued a legal notice to healthcare bodies requiring them to share confidential patient information with other healthcare bodies where this is required to diagnose, control and prevent the spread of the virus and manage the pandemic. This includes sharing Additional Information through Summary Care Records, unless a patient objects to this.

If you have already expressed a preference to only have Core information shared in your Summary Care Record, or to opt-out completely of having a Summary Care Record, these preferences will continue to be respected and this change will not apply to you. For everyone else, the Summary Care Record will be updated to include the Additional Information. This change of requirement will be reviewed after the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Why we have made this change

In order to look after your health and care needs, health and social care bodies may share your confidential patient information contained in your Summary Care Record with clinical and non-clinical staff in other health and care organisations, for example hospitals, NHS 111 and out of hours organisations. These changes will improve the healthcare that you receive away from your usual GP practice.

Your rights in relation to your Summary Care Record

Regardless of your past decisions about your Summary Care Record preferences, you will still have the same options that you currently have in place to opt out of having a Summary Care Record, including the opportunity to opt-back in to having a Summary Care Record or opt back in to allow sharing of Additional Information.

You can exercise these rights by doing the following:

1. Choose to have a Summary Care Record with all information shared. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see a detailed Summary Care Record, including Core and Additional Information, if they need to provide you with direct care.
2. Choose to have a Summary Care Record with Core information only. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see limited information about allergies and medications in your Summary Care Record if they need to provide you with direct care.
3. Choose to opt-out of having a Summary Care Record altogether. This means that you do not want any information shared with other authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals involved in your direct care. You will not be able to change this preference at the time if you require direct care away from your GP practice. This means that no authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see information held in your GP records if they need to provide you with direct care, including in an emergency.

To make these changes, you should inform your GP practice or complete this form and return it to your GP practice.

Patient Communication

Because we are obliged to protect any confidential information, we hold about you and we take this very seriously, it is imperative that you let us know immediately if you change any of your contact details.

We may contact you using SMS texting to your mobile phone if we need to notify you about appointments and other services that we provide to you involving your direct care, therefore you must ensure that we have your up-to-date details. This is to ensure we are sure we are contacting you and not another person. As this is operated on an ‘opt out’ basis we will assume that you give us permission to contact you via SMS if you have provided us with your mobile telephone number. Please let us know if you wish to opt out of this SMS service. We may also contact you using the email address you have provided to us. Please ensure that we have your up-to-date details.

There may be occasions where authorised research facilities would like you to take part in research. Your contact details may be used to invite you to receive further information about such research opportunities.

The NHS App

We use the NHS Account Messaging Service provided by NHS England to send you messages relating to your health and care. You need to be an NHS App user to receive these messages. Further information about the service can be found at the privacy notice for the NHS App managed by NHS England.

Safeguarding

The Practice is dedicated to ensuring that the principles and duties of safeguarding adults and children are holistically, consistently, and conscientiously applied with the wellbeing of all, at the heart of what we do.

Our legal basis for processing For the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) purposes is: –

Article 6(1)(e) ‘…exercise of official authority…’.

For the processing of special categories data, the basis is: –

Article 9(2)(b) – ‘processing is necessary for the purposes of carrying out the obligations and exercising specific rights of the controller or of the data subject in the field of employment and social security and social protection law…’

Research

Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) collects de-identified patient data from a network of GP practices across the UK. Primary care data are linked to a range of other health related data to provide a longitudinal, representative UK population health dataset.  You can opt out of your information being used for research purposes at any time (see below), full details can be found here: –

https://cprd.com/transparency-information

The legal bases for processing this information

CPRD do not hold or process personal data on patients; however, NHS Digital (formally the Health and Social Care Centre) may process ‘personal data’ for us as an accredited ‘safe haven’ or ‘trusted third-party’ within the NHS when linking GP data with data from other sources. The legal bases for processing this data are:

• Medicines and medical device monitoring: Article 6(e) and Article 9(2)(i) – public interest in the area of public health
• Medical research and statistics: Article 6(e) and Article 9(2)(j) – public interest and scientific research purposes

Any data CPRD hold or pass on to bona fide researchers, except for clinical research studies, will have been anonymised in accordance with the Information Commissioner’s Office Anonymisation Code of Practice. We will hold data indefinitely for the benefit of future research, but studies will normally only hold the data we release to them for twelve months.

Categories of personal data

The data collected by Practice staff in the event of a safeguarding situation will be as much personal information as is possible that is necessary to obtain in order to handle the situation. In addition to some basic demographic and contact details, we will also process details of what the safeguarding concern is. This is likely to be special category information (such as health information).

Sources of the data

The Practice will either receive or collect information when someone contacts the organisation with safeguarding concerns, or we believe there may be safeguarding concerns and make enquiries to relevant providers.

Recipients of personal data

The information is used by the Practice when handling a safeguarding incident or concern. We may share information accordingly to ensure duty of care and investigation as required with other partners such as local authorities, the police or healthcare professionals (i.e. their GP or mental health team).

National Obesity Audit (NOA)

Background: 

More than one in four adults are currently living with obesity. We know obesity puts people at greater risk of many serious diseases and increases their chances of associated comorbidities e.g., cancers, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes.

What is the National Obesity Audit? 

NHS England has established a National Obesity Audit (NOA) to bring together comparable data from the different types of weight management services across England. For the NOA to be successful, linking to primary care patient-level data is a critical part of the project to enable analysis of longitudinal weight change, to inform improvement aims.

How will the NOA benefit patients? 

By linking to GP patient-level data with weight management service data, the NOA will provide information across the weight management pathway to support quality improvements to patient care. For example, equity of access, improving outcomes of weight management services, reducing obesity-related comorbidities, and improving population health.

What information is collected? 

The NOA data collection includes both personal data and special categories of personal data relating to patients living with overweight or obesity, including:

• Demographic information – such as NHS number, date of birth, postcode, sex and ethnicity
• Health information – such as Body Mass Index (BMI), obesity-related co-morbidities, healthcare interventions such as weight loss advice and bariatric surgery.

More information on the data used for the purposes of the NOA is available in the NOA dataset specification

How the NOA will use your data

NOA data will be used for the purposes of informing policy and guidelines for managing obesity across the NHS and local authorities.  It will also be used for benchmarking and to enable NHS providers to maximise the use of their resources and to improve patient outcomes.

NHS England will analyse the data held in the NOA to carry out data quality checks, to pseudonymise the data (de-identify) and to derive values, for example turn date of birth into age.

Data in the NOA may also be linked to other data that NHS England holds, including the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Audit (CVD Prevent) and the Community Services Data Set (CSDS).

NOA data is used to create regular statistical publications on the NHS England website including dashboards and an annual report.  All data published is anonymous and aggregate so that patients cannot be identified from the data.

The data collected for the NOA from the CVD Prevent Audit will not be used for performance management of GPs.

NOA legal basis

Data protection law requires NHS England to have a legal basis before we can use your personal data.

Our legal basis is:

Legal obligation

Article 6(1)(c) of UK GDPR.  This is because the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has issued NHS England with a Direction to analyse this data for NOA purposes. This Direction is called the National Obesity Audit Directions 2023

We also need an additional legal basis in the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) to use data which is extra sensitive. This is known as ‘special categories of personal data’. Our legal basis to use data relating to your health and ethnicity is:

Substantial public interest 

Article 9(2)(g) of UK GDPR, plus Schedule 1, Part 2, Paragraph 6 “statutory etc and government purposes” of DPA 2018

Health or social care

Article 9(2)(h) of UK GDPR, plus Schedule 1, Part 1, Paragraph 2 “Health or social care purposes” of DPA 2018.

The NOA and NHSE will share this data with

We treat the data we hold with great care. All data which is shared by NHS England is subject to robust rules relating to privacy, security and confidentiality and only the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the relevant health and social care purpose will ever be shared.

Data is shared or is expected to be shared with organisations such as healthcare providers, clinicians, and commissioners of NHS services, for example:

• the organisation that provided your care:to assess the effectiveness of your care and to improve the services they offer
• The Department of Health and Social Care:to inform policy and guidelines
• organisations responsible for the commissioning of NHS services in England, such as Integrated Care Boards: to plan and improve weight management services and for benchmarking
• local authorities:to help plan and improve weight management services
• research organisations, including universities and charities:to carry out research

These organisations must apply for access to NOA data through NHS England’s Data Access Request Service.  Each application is assessed very carefully to make sure that the organisation:

• has a legal basis to access the data for that purpose
• will use the data for the benefit of health and care and for the agreed purposes only
• will handle and store the data securely

We only share data which can identify you (identifiable data) if this is absolutely necessary and the organisation who has made an application for data cannot achieve their purpose without it.  Where possible we remove information from the data which identifies you, or we replace it with a unique reference number (this is known as pseudonymisation).

Each organisation we share data with must sign a Data Sharing Framework Contract and a Data Sharing Agreement and we carry out audits to check they are using the data as agreed.

Details about the NOA data we have shared with other organisations, except for anonymous data, will be published in the NHS England Data Uses Register.

Practice Third party processors

To deliver the best possible service, the practice will share data (where required) with other NHS bodies such as other GP practices and hospitals. In addition, the practice will use carefully selected third party service providers. When we use a third-party service provider to process data on our behalf then we will always have an appropriate agreement in place to ensure that they keep the data secure, that they do not use or share information other than in accordance with our instructions and that they are operating appropriately. Examples of functions that may be carried out by third parties include:

• Companies that provide IT services & support, including our core clinical systems; systems which manage patient facing services (such as our website and service accessible through the same); data hosting service providers; systems which facilitate appointment bookings or electronic prescription services; document management services etc.
• Delivery services (for example if we were to arrange for delivery of any medicines to you).
• Payment providers (if for example you were paying for a prescription or a service such as travel vaccinations).

Further details regarding specific third-party processors can be supplied on request to the Data Protection Officer as below.

How do we maintain the confidentiality of your records? 

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will only use information collected lawfully in accordance with:

• Data Protection Act 2018
• The General Data Protection Regulations 2016
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Common Law Duty of Confidentiality
• Health and Social Care Act 2012
• NHS Codes of Confidentiality, Information Security and Records Management
• Information: To Share or Not to Share Review

Every member of staff who works for an NHS organisation has a legal obligation to keep information about you confidential.

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), where the law requires information to be passed on and / or in accordance with the information sharing principle following Dame Fiona Caldicott’s information sharing review (Information to share or not to share) where “The duty to share information can be as important as the duty to protect patient confidentiality.” This means that health and social care professionals should have the confidence to share information in the best interests of their patients within the framework set out by the Caldicott principles.

Our practice policy is to respect the privacy of our patients, their families and our staff and to maintain compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and all UK specific Data Protection Requirements. Our policy is to ensure all personal data related to our patients will be protected.

All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. The practice will, if required, sign a separate confidentiality agreement if the client deems it necessary.  If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

In certain circumstances you may have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of data. Please contact the Data Protection Officer in writing if you wish to withdraw your consent.  If some circumstances, we may need to store your data after your consent has been withdrawn to comply with a legislative requirement.

Some of this information will be held centrally and used for statistical purposes. Where we do this, we take strict measures to ensure that individual patients cannot be identified. Sometimes your information may be requested to be used for research purposes – the surgery will always gain your consent before releasing the information for this purpose in an identifiable format.   In some circumstances you can Opt-out of the surgery sharing any of your information for research purposes.

With your consent we would also like to use your information

There are times that we may want to use your information to contact you or offer you services, not directly about your healthcare, in these instances we will always gain your consent to contact you.  We would however like to use your name, contact details, and email address to inform you of other services that may benefit you.  We will only do this with your consent.  There may be occasions where authorised research facilities would like you to take part on innovations, research, improving services or identifying trends, you will be asked to opt into such programmes if you are happy to do so.

At any stage where we would like to use your data for anything other than the specified purposes and where there is no lawful requirement for us to share or process your data, we will ensure that you have the ability to consent and opt out prior to any data processing taking place.
This information is not shared with third parties or used for any marketing and you can unsubscribe at any time via phone, email or by informing the practice DPO as below.

National Opt-Out Facility

You can choose whether your confidential patient information is used for research and planning.

Who can use your confidential patient information for research and planning?

It is used by the NHS, local authorities, university and hospital researchers, medical colleges and pharmaceutical companies researching new treatments.

Making your data opt-out choice

You can choose to opt out of sharing your confidential patient information for research and planning. There may still be times when your confidential patient information is used: for example, during an epidemic where there might be a risk to you or to other people’s health. You can also still consent to take part in a specific research project.

Will choosing this opt-out affect your care and treatment?

No, your confidential patient information will still be used for your individual care. Choosing to opt out will not affect your care and treatment. You will still be invited for screening services, such as screenings for bowel cancer.

What should you do next?

You do not need to do anything if you are happy about how your confidential patient information is used.

If you do not want your confidential patient information to be used for research and planning, you can choose to opt out securely online or through a telephone service.

You can change your choice at any time. To find out more or to make your choice visit nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters or call 0300 303 5678

NHS Digital Data Collection from the Practice

The NHS needs data about the patients it treats to plan and deliver its services and to ensure that care and treatment provided is safe and effective. The General Practice Data for Planning and Research data collection will help the NHS to improve health and care services for everyone by collecting patient data that can be used to do this. For example, patient data can help the NHS to:

• monitor the long-term safety and effectiveness of care
• plan how to deliver better health and care services
• prevent the spread of infectious diseases
• identify new treatments and medicines through health research

GP practices already share patient data for these purposes, but this new data collection will be more efficient and effective.

This means that GPs can get on with looking after their patients, and NHS Digital can provide controlled access to patient data to the NHS and other organisations who need to use it, to improve health and care for everyone.

Contributing to research projects will benefit us all as better and safer treatments are introduced more quickly and effectively without compromising your privacy and confidentiality.

NHS Digital has engaged with the British Medical Association (BMA), Royal College of GPs (RCGP) and the National Data Guardian (NDG) to ensure relevant safeguards are in place for patients and GP practices.

NHS Digital purposes for processing patient data

Patient data from GP medical records kept by GP practices in England is used every day to improve health, care and services through planning and research, helping to find better treatments and improve patient care. The NHS is introducing an improved way to share this information – called the General Practice Data for Planning and Research data collection.

NHS Digital will collect, analyse, publish, and share this patient data to improve health and care services for everyone. This includes:

• informing and developing health and social care policy
• planning and commissioning health and care services
• taking steps to protect public health (including managing and monitoring the coronavirus pandemic)
• in exceptional circumstances, providing you with individual care
• enabling healthcare and scientific research

Any data that NHS Digital collects will only be used for health and care purposes. It is never shared with marketing or insurance companies.

What patient data NHS Digital collect

Patient data will be collected from GP medical records about:

• any living patient registered at a GP practice in England when the collection started – this includes children and adults
• any patient who died after the data collection started, and was previously registered at a GP practice in England when the data collection started

While 1 September has been seen by some as a cut-off date for opt-out, after which data extraction would begin, Government has stated this will not be the case and data extraction will not commence until NHS Digital have met the tests.

The NHS is introducing three changes to the opt-out system which mean that patients will be able to change their opt-out status at any time:

• Patients do not need to register a Type 1 opt-out by 1 September to ensure their GP data will not be uploaded
• NHS Digital will create the technical means to allow GP data that has previously been uploaded to the system via the GPDPR collection to be deleted when someone registers a Type 1 opt-out
• The plan to retire Type 1 opt-outs will be deferred for at least 12 months while we get the new arrangements up and running, and will not be implemented without consultation with the RCGP, the BMA and the National Data Guardian

We will not collect your name or where you live. Any other data that could directly identify you, for example NHS number, General Practice Local Patient Number, full postcode and date of birth, is replaced with unique codes which are produced by de-identification software before the data is shared with NHS Digital.

This process is called pseudonymisation and means that no one will be able to directly identify you in the data. The diagram below helps to explain what this means. Using the terms in the diagram, the data we collect would be described as de-personalised.

Image provided by Understanding Patient Data under licence.

NHS Digital will be able to use the same software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason. Only NHS Digital has the ability to do this. This would mean that the data became personally identifiable data in the diagram above. An example would be where you consent to your identifiable data being shared with a research project or clinical trial in which you are participating, as they need to know the data is about you.

More information about when we may be able to re-identify the data is in the who we share your patient data with section below.

The NHS Digital programme will be providing further information as the programme progresses. In the meantime, if you have any questions, you can contact the programme at [email protected].

The NHS Digital web pages also provide further information at https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/data-collections-and-data-sets/data-collections/general-practice-data-for-planning-and-research#additional-information-for-gp-practices.

The Data NHD Digital collect

We will only collect structured and coded data from patient medical records that is needed for specific health and social care purposes explained above.

Data that directly identifies you as an individual patient, including your NHS number, General Practice Local Patient Number, full postcode, date of birth and if relevant date of death, is replaced with unique codes produced by de-identification software before it is sent to NHS Digital. This means that no one will be able to directly identify you in the data.

NHS Digital will be able to use the software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason. This would mean that the data became personally identifiable in the diagram above. It will still be held securely and protected, including when it is shared by NHS Digital.

NHS Digital will collect

• data on your sex, ethnicity and sexual orientation
• clinical codes and data about diagnoses, symptoms, observations, test results, medications, allergies, immunisations, referrals and recalls, and appointments, including information about your physical, mental and sexual health
• data about staff who have treated you

More detailed information about the patient data we collect is contained in the Data Provision Notice issued to GP practices.

NHS Digital Does not collect.

• your name and address (except for your postcode in unique coded form)
• written notes (free text), such as the details of conversations with doctors and nurses
• images, letters and documents
• coded data that is not needed due to its age – for example medication, referral and appointment data that is over 10 years old
• coded data that GPs are not permitted to share by law – for example certain codes about IVF treatment, and certain information about gender re-assignment

Opting out of NHS Digital collecting your data (Type 1 Opt-out)

If you do not want your identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) to be shared outside of your GP practice for purposes except for your own care, you can register an opt-out with your GP practice. This is known as a Type 1 Opt-out.

Type 1 Opt-outs were introduced in 2013 for data sharing from GP practices but may be discontinued in the future as a new opt-out has since been introduced to cover the broader health and care system, called the National Data Opt-out. If this happens people who have registered a Type 1 Opt-out will be informed. More about National Data Opt-outs is in the section Who we share patient data with.

NHS Digital will not collect any patient data for patients who have already registered a Type 1 Opt-out in line with current policy. If this changes patients who have registered a Type 1 Opt-out will be informed.

If you do not want your patient data shared with NHS Digital, you can register a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice. You can register a Type 1 Opt-out at any time. You can also change your mind at any time and withdraw a Type 1 Opt-out.

Data sharing with NHS Digital will start on 1 September 2021.

If you have already registered a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice your data will not be shared with NHS Digital.

If you wish to register a Type 1 Opt-out with your GP practice before data sharing starts with NHS Digital, this should be done by returning this form to your GP practice. If you have previously registered a Type 1 Opt-out and you would like to withdraw this, you can also use the form to do this. You can send the form by post or email to your GP practice or call 0300 3035678 for a form to be sent out to you.

If you register a Type 1 Opt-out after your patient data has already been shared with NHS Digital, no more of your data will be shared with NHS Digital. NHS Digital will however still hold the patient data which was shared with us before you registered the Type 1 Opt-out.

If you do not want NHS Digital to share your identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) with anyone else for purposes beyond your own care, then you can also register a National Data Opt-out. There is more about National Data Opt-outs and when they apply in the National Data Opt-out section below.

NHS Digital legal basis for collecting, analysing, and sharing patient data.

When we collect, analyse, publish, and share patient data, there are strict laws in place that we must follow. Under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), this includes explaining to you what legal provisions apply under GDPR that allows us to process patient data. The GDPR protects everyone’s data.

NHS Digital has been directed by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care under the General Practice Data for Planning and Research Directions 2021 to collect and analyse data from GP practices for health and social care purposes including policy, planning, commissioning, public health and research purposes.

NHS Digital is the controller of the patient data collected and analysed under the GDPR jointly with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.

All GP practices in England are legally required to share data with NHS Digital for this purpose under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 (2012 Act). More information about this requirement is contained in the Data Provision Notice issued by NHS Digital to GP practices.

NHS Digital has various powers to publish anonymous statistical data and to share patient data under sections 260 and 261 of the 2012 Act. It also has powers to share data under other Acts, for example the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007.

Regulation 3 of the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002 (COPI) also allow confidential patient information to be used and shared appropriately and lawfully in a public health emergency. The Secretary of State has issued legal notices under COPI (COPI Notices) requiring NHS Digital, NHS England and Improvement, arm’s-length bodies (such as Public Health England), local authorities, NHS trusts, Integrated Care Boards and GP practices to share confidential patient information to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak. Any information used or shared during the COVID-19 outbreak will be limited to the period of the outbreak unless there is another legal basis to use confidential patient information.

The legal basis under UKGDPR for General Practice Data for Planning and Research

How NHS Digital use patient data

NHS Digital will analyse and link the patient data we collect with other patient data we hold to create national data sets and for data quality purposes.

NHS Digital will be able to use the de-identification software to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances for these purposes, where this is necessary and where there is a valid legal reason. There are strict internal approvals which need to be in place before we can do this and this will be subject to independent scrutiny and oversight by the Independent Group Advising on the Release of Data (IGARD).

These national data sets are analysed and used by NHS Digital to produce national statistics and management information, including public dashboards about health and social care which are published. We never publish any patient data that could identify you. All data we publish is anonymous statistical data.

For more information about data, we publish see Data and Information and Data Dashboards.

We may also carry out analysis on national data sets for data quality purposes and to support the work of others for the purposes set out in Our purposes for processing patient data section above.

Who NHS Digital share patient data with

All data which is shared by NHS Digital is subject to robust rules relating to privacy, security, and confidentiality and only the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the relevant health and social care purpose will be shared.

All requests to access patient data from this collection, other than anonymous aggregate statistical data, will be assessed by NHS Digital’s Data Access Request Service, to make sure that organisations have a legal basis to use the data and that it will be used safely, securely and appropriately.

These requests for access to patient data will also be subject to independent scrutiny and oversight by the Independent Group Advising on the Release of Data (IGARD). Organisations approved to use this data will be required to enter into a data sharing agreement with NHS Digital regulating the use of the data.

There are several organisations who are likely to need access to different elements of patient data from the General Practice Data for Planning and Research collection. These include but may not be limited to:

• the Department of Health and Social Care and its executive agencies, including Public Health England and other government departments
• NHS England and NHS Improvement
• primary care networks (PCNs), Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) and integrated care organisations (ICOs)
• local authorities
• research organisations, including universities, charities, clinical research organisations that run clinical trials and pharmaceutical companies

If the request is approved, the data will either be made available within a secure data access environment within NHS Digital infrastructure, or where the needs of the recipient cannot be met this way, as a direct dissemination of data. We plan to reduce the amount of data being processed outside central, secure data environments and increase the data we make available to be accessed via our secure data access environment. For more information read about improved data access in improving our data processing services.

Data will always be shared in the uniquely coded form (de-personalised data in the diagram above) unless in the circumstances of any specific request it is necessary for it to be provided in an identifiable form (personally identifiable data in the diagram above). For example, when express patient consent has been given to a researcher to link patient data from the General Practice for Planning and Research collection to data the researcher has already obtained from the patient.

It is therefore possible for NHS Digital to convert the unique codes back to data that could directly identify you in certain circumstances, and where there is a valid legal reason which permits this without breaching the common law duty of confidentiality. This would include:

• where the data was needed by a health professional for your own care and treatment
• where you have expressly consented to this, for example to participate in a clinical trial
• where there is a legal obligation, for example where the COPI Notices apply – see Our legal basis for collecting, analysing and sharing patient data above for more information on this
• where approval has been provided by the Health Research Authority or the Secretary of State with support from the Confidentiality Advisory Group (CAG) under Regulation 5 of the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002 (COPI) – this is sometimes known as a ‘section 251 approval’

This would mean that the data was personally identifiable in the diagram above. Re-identification of the data would only take place following approval of the specific request through the Data Access Request Service, and subject to independent assurance by IGARD and consultation with the Professional Advisory Group, which is made up of representatives from the BMA and the RCGP. If you have registered a National Data Opt-out, this would be applied in accordance with the National Data Opt-out policy before any identifiable patient data (personally identifiable data in the diagram above) about you was shared. More about the National Data Opt-out is in the section below.

Details of who we have shared data with, in what form and for what purposes are published on our data release register.

The practice is one of many organisations working in the health and care system to improve care for patients and the public.

Whenever you use a health or care service, such as attending Accident & Emergency or using Community Care services, important information about you is collected in a patient record for that service. Collecting this information helps to ensure you get the best possible care and treatment.

The information collected about you when you use these services can also be used and provided to other organisations for purposes beyond your individual care, for instance to help with:

• improving the quality and standards of care provided
• research into the development of new treatments
• preventing illness and diseases
• monitoring safety
• planning services

This may only take place when there is a clear legal basis to use this information. All these uses help to provide better health and care for you, your family and future generations. Confidential patient information about your health and care is only used like this where allowed by law.

Most of the time, anonymised data is used for research and planning so that you cannot be identified in which case your confidential patient information isn’t needed.

You have a choice about whether you want your confidential patient information to be used in this way. If you are happy with this use of information you do not need to do anything. If you do choose to opt out your confidential patient information will still be used to support your individual care.

To find out more or to register your choice to opt out, please visit www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters.  On this web page you will:

• See what is meant by confidential patient information
• Find examples of when confidential patient information is used for individual care and examples of when it is used for purposes beyond individual care
• Find out more about the benefits of sharing data
• Understand more about who uses the data
• Find out how your data is protected
• Be able to access the system to view, set or change your opt-out setting
• Find the contact telephone number if you want to know any more or to set/change your opt-out by phone
• See the situations where the opt-out will not apply

You can also find out more about how patient information is used at:

https://www.hra.nhs.uk/information-about-patients/ (which covers health and care research); and

https://understandingpatientdata.org.uk/what-you-need-know (which covers how and why patient information is used, the safeguards and how decisions are made)

You can change your mind about your choice at any time.

Data being used or shared for purposes beyond individual care does not include your data being shared with insurance companies or used for marketing purposes and data would only be used in this way with your specific agreement.

Health and care organisations have until 2020 to put systems and processes in place so they can be compliant with the national data opt-out and apply your choice to any confidential patient information they use or share for purposes beyond your individual care. Our organisation ‘is / is not currently’ compliant with the national data opt-out policy.

Where do we store your information electronically?

All the personal data we process is processed by our staff in the UK however for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance this information may be located on servers within the European Union.

No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so and appropriate safeguards have been put in place such as a Data Processor as above).  We have a Data Protection regime in place to oversee the effective and secure processing of your personal and or special category (sensitive, confidential) data.

EMIS Web

The Practice uses a clinical system provided by a Data Processor called EMIS, from 10^th June 2019, EMIS started storing your practice’s EMIS Web data in a highly secure, third-party cloud hosted environment, namely Amazon Web Services (“AWS”).

The data will remain in the UK at all times and will be fully encrypted both in transit and at rest. In doing this, there will be no change to the control of access to your data and the hosted service provider will not have any access to the decryption keys. AWS is one of the world’s largest cloud companies, already supporting numerous public sector clients (including the NHS), and it offers the very highest levels of security and support.

Who are our partner organisations?

We may also have to share your information, subject to strict agreements on how it will be used, with the following organisations.

• NHS Trusts / Foundation Trusts
• GP’s
• Primary Care Network
• NHS Commissioning Support Units
• Independent Contractors such as dentists, opticians, pharmacists
• Private Sector Providers
• Voluntary Sector Providers
• Ambulance Trusts
• Integrated Care Boards
• Social Care Services
• NHS England (NHSE) and NHS Digital (NHSD)
• Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH)
• Local Authorities
• Education Services
• Fire and Rescue Services
• Police & Judicial Services
• Voluntary Sector Providers
• Private Sector Providers
• Other ‘data processors’ which you will be informed of

You will be informed who your data will be shared with and in some cases asked for consent for this to happen when this is required.

Computer System

This practice operates a Clinical Computer System on which NHS Staff record information securely.  This information can then be shared with other clinicians so that everyone caring for you is fully informed about your medical history, including allergies and medication.

To provide around the clock safe care, unless you have asked us not to, we will make information available to our Partner Organisation (above).  Wherever possible, their staff will ask your consent before your information is viewed.

Shared Care Records

To support your care and improve the sharing of relevant information to our partner organisations (as above) when they are involved in looking after you, we will share information to other systems.  You can opt out of this sharing of your records with our partners at anytime if this sharing is based on your consent.

We may also use external companies to process personal information, such as for archiving purposes. These companies are bound by contractual agreements to ensure information is kept confidential and secure.  All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

Sharing your information without consent

We will normally ask you for your consent, but there are times when we may be required by law to share your information without your consent, for example:

• where there is a serious risk of harm or abuse to you or other people;
• Safeguarding matters and investigations
• where a serious crime, such as assault, is being investigated or where it could be prevented;
• notification of new births;
• where we encounter infectious diseases that may endanger the safety of others, such as meningitis or measles (but not HIV/AIDS);
• where a formal court order has been issued;
• where there is a legal requirement, for example if you had committed a Road Traffic Offence.

How long will we store your information?

We are required under UK law to keep your information and data for the full retention periods as specified by the NHS Records management code of practice for health and social care and national archives requirements.

More information on records retention can be found online at (https://digital.nhs.uk/article/1202/Records-Management-Code-of-Practice-for-Health-and-Social-Care-2016).

How can you access, amend move the personal data that you have given to us?

Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise.

Right to object: If we are using your data and you do not agree, you have the right to object. We will respond to your request within one month (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases). This is NOT an absolute right sometimes we will need to process your data even if you object.

Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example for a research project, or consent to send you information about us or matters you may be interested in), you may withdraw your consent at any time.

Right to erasure: In certain situations (for example, where we have processed your data unlawfully), you have the right to request us to “erase” your personal data. We will respond to your request within one month (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases) and will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply. If we do agree to your request, we will delete your data but will need to keep a note of your name/ other basic details on our register of individuals who would prefer not to be contacted. This enables us to avoid contacting you in the future where your data are collected in unconnected circumstances. If you would prefer us not to do this, you are free to say so.

Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your data from us to another data controller. We will help with this with a GP to GP data transfer and transfer of your hard copy notes.

Primary Care Network

The objective of primary care networks (PCNs) is for group practices together to create more collaborative workforces which ease the pressure of GP’s, leaving them better able to focus on patient care.  This practice is a member of the Walsall South 2 PCN.  Other members of the network are Palfrey Health Centre and St Peters Surgery.

Primary Care Networks form a key building block of the NHS long-term plan. Bringing general practices together to work at scale has been a policy priority for some years for a range of reasons, including improving the ability of practices to recruit and retain staff; to manage financial and estates pressures; to provide a wider range of services to patients and to more easily integrate with the wider health and care system.

This means the practice may share your information with other practices within the PCN to provide you with your care and treatment.

Service Evaluation

The PCN carries out service evaluations in order to improve the quality and accessibility of primary care services. This may be carried out in a number of ways including telephone surveys, online surveys and interviews.

The legal basis for contacting you to take part –

Article 6, e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller;”

Article 9, (h) processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems

To process the survey information, we collect from you we will only do so with your consent.

Article 6(1)(a)  – Consent of the data subject (you)

Article 9(2)(a) – Explicit consent of the data subject. (you)’

Population Health Management

Population Health Management (or PHM for short) is aimed at improving the health of an entire population.  It is being implemented across the NHS and this Practice is taking part in a project as a time limited pilot across named practices in Derby and Derbyshire.

The PHM approach requires health care organisations to work together with communities and partner agencies, for example, GP practices, community service providers, hospitals and other health and social care providers.   These organisations will share and combine information with each other in order to get a view of health and services for the population in a particular area. This information sharing is subject to robust security arrangements.

As part of this programme, personal data about your health care will have all identifiers removed (like your name or NHS Number) and replaced with a code which will be linked to information about care received in different health care settings.  If we see that an individual might benefit from some additional care or support, we will send the information back to your GP or hospital provider and they will use the code to identify you and offer you relevant services.

As part of this programme your GP and other care providers will send the information they hold on their systems to the North Of England Commissioning Support Unit (NECS).  NECS are part of NHS England. More information can be found here https://www.necsu.nhs.uk

NECS will link all the information together. Your GP and other care providers will then review this information and make decisions about the whole population or particular patients that might need additional support.  NECS work in partnership with a company called Optum to help them with this work.  Both NECS and Optum are legally obliged to protect your information and maintain confidentiality in the same way that your GP or hospital provider is. More information about Optum can be found here www.optum.co.uk.

Health and Social Care Providers are permitted by data protection law to use personal information where it is ‘necessary for medical purposes’. This includes caring for you directly as well as management of health services more generally.

The PHM project is time-limited to 22 weeks.  Once the project has completed all de-identified , information processed by NECS / Optum will be securely destroyed.  This will not affect any personal information held by your GP or other health or social care providers.

Access to your personal information 

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You have a right under the Data Protection legislation to request access to view or to obtain copies of what information the surgery holds about you and to have it amended should it be inaccurate. To request this, you need to do the following:

• Your request should be made to the Practice. (For information from a hospital or other Trust/ NHS organisation you should write direct to them.
• There is no charge to have a copy of the information held about you
• We are required to provide you with information within one month
• You will need to give adequate information (for example full name, address, date of birth, NHS number and details of your request) so that your identity can be verified, and your records located information we hold about you at any time.

What should you do if your personal information changes?

You should tell us so that we can update our records please contact the Practice Manager as soon as any of your details change, this is especially important for changes of address or contact details (such as your mobile phone number), the practice will from time to time ask you to confirm that the information we currently hold is accurate and up-to-date.

Online Access

You may ask us if you wish to have online access to your medical record. However, there will be certain protocols that we have to follow to give you online access, including written consent and the production of documents that prove your identity.

Please note that when we give you online access, the responsibility is yours to make sure that you keep your information safe and secure if you do not wish any third party to gain access.

Third parties mentioned on your medical record

Sometimes we record information about third parties mentioned by you to us during any consultation, or contained in letters we receive from other organisations. We are under an obligation to make sure we also protect that third party’s rights as an individual and to ensure that references to them which may breach their rights to confidentiality, are removed before we send any information to any other party including yourself.

The NHS wants to give people better ways to see their personal health information online. We know that people want to be able to access their health records. It can help you see test results faster. It also lets you read and review notes from your appointments in your own time.

From 01/11/2022 patients can see all the information within their health record upon request and following activation by their surgery. If you are over 16 and have an online account, such as through the NHS App, NHS website, or another online primary care service, you will, following activation by your surgery, be able to see all future notes and health records from your doctor (GP).

This means that you will be able to see notes from your appointments, as well as test results and any letters that are saved on your records. This only applies to records from your doctor (GP), not from hospitals or other specialists. You will only be able to see information the date your application is processed by the surgery.

Your doctor (GP) may talk to you to discuss test results before you are able to see some of your information on the app. Your doctor (GP) may also talk to you before your full records access is given to make sure that having access is of benefit to you. There might be some sensitive information on your record, so you should talk to your doctor if you have any concerns.

These changes only apply to people with online accounts. If you do not want an online account, you can still access your health records by requesting this information through reception. The changes also only apply to personal information about you. If you are a carer and would like to see information about someone you care for, speak to reception staff.

The NHS App, website and other online services are all very secure, so no one is able to access your information except you. You’ll need to make sure you protect your login details. Don’t share your password with anyone as they will then have access to your personal information.

If you do not want to see your health record, or if you would like more information about these changes, please speak to your GP or reception staff.

Our website

The only website this Privacy Notice applies to is the Surgery’s website. If you use a link to any other website from the Surgery’s website then you will need to read their respective Privacy Notice. We take no responsibility (legal or otherwise) for the content of other websites.

The Surgery’s website uses cookies. For more information on which cookies we use and how we use them, please see our Cookies Policy.

CCTV recording

CCTV is installed on our practice premises covering both the external area of the building and the internal area excluding consulting rooms. Images are held to improve the personal security of patients and staff whilst on the premises, and for the prevention and detection of crime. The images are recorded onto an integral hard drive of the equipment and are overwritten on a rolling basis. Viewing of these digital images is password protected and controlled by the Practice Manager.

Telephone system

Our telephone system records all telephone calls.  Recordings are retained for up to three years (dependant on storage capacity), and are used periodically for the purposes of seeking clarification where there is a dispute as to what was said and for staff training Access to these recordings is restricted to named senior staff.

Video Consultations

The practice may use video consultations to see patients who may not need to attend the surgery in person, all such systems are NHS security checked and authorised, the practice has a video consultation policy and the statutory powers to process your data via this method of communication, are as above for direct care.

Medical Examiner Service

Following the death of any patients of [Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) we are now obliged to inform Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust, Medical Examiner Service.

Medical examiner offices at acute trusts now provide independent scrutiny of non-coronial deaths occurring in acute hospitals.  The role of these offices is now being extended to also cover deaths occurring in the community.

Medical examiner offices are led by medical examiners, senior doctors from a range of specialties including general practice, who provide independent scrutiny of deaths not taken at the outset for coroner investigation. They put the bereaved at the centre of processes after the death of a patient, by giving families and next of kin an opportunity to ask questions and raise concerns. Medical examiners carry out a proportionate review of medical records, and liaise with doctors completing the Medical Certificate of Cause of Death (MCCD).

The Practice will share any patient with the service upon request.

Objections / Complaints

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed at the GP, please contact the GP Practice Manager or the Data Protection Officer as above. If you are still unhappy following a review by the GP practice, you have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe house, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 01625 545745

https://ico.org.uk/

If you are happy for your data to be used for the purposes described in this privacy notice, then you do not need to do anything.  If you have any concerns about how your data is shared, then please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

If you would like to know more about your rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as below.

Data Protection Officer:

The Practice Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey of PCIG Consulting Limited. Any queries regarding Data Protection issues should be addressed to him at: –

Email:   [email protected]

Postal: PCIG Consulting Limited, 7 Westacre Drive, Quarry Bank, Dudley, West Midlands, DY5 2EE

Changes:

It is important to point out that we may amend this Privacy Notice from time to time.  If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of our Privacy Notice, please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

How we use your Information

Updated for the UK GDPR 2016 and Data Protection Act 2018

Better information, better health

This leaflet explains:

• Why the Practice collects information about you and how it is used
• Who we may share information with
• Your right to see your health records and how we keep your records confidential

How we keep your records confidential

Everyone working for the NHS has a legal duty to keep information about you confidential.

We have a duty to

• Maintain full and accurate records of the care we provide to you
• Keep records about you confidential, secure and accurate
• Provide information in a format that is accessible to you (i.e., in large type if you are partially sighted).

We will not share information that identifies you for any reason, unless:

• you ask us to do so;
• we ask, and you give us specific permission;
• we must do this by law;
• we have special permission for health or research purposes or
• we have special permission because the interests of the public are thought to be of greater importance than your confidentiality

Our guiding principle is that we are holding your records in STRICT CONFIDENCE

Why we collect information about you

In the Practice we aim to provide you with the highest quality of health care.  To do this we must keep records about you, your health and the care we have provided or plan to provide to you.

These records may include:

• Basic details about you, such as address, date of birth, next of kin
• Contact we have had with you such as clinical visits
• Details and records about your treatment and care
• Results of x-rays, laboratory test etc.,
• Relevant information from people who care for you and know you well, such as health professionals and relatives

It is good practice for people in the NHS who provide care to:

• discuss and agree with you what they are going to record about you
• give you a copy of letters they are writing about you; and
• show you what they have recorded about you, if you ask.

We will only store your information in identifiable form for a long as in necessary in and in accordance with the NHS England’s Rules found here: – Records Management Code of Practice 2020 – NHSX

How your records are used

The people who care for you use your records to:

• Provide a good basis for all health decisions made by you and care professionals
• Allow you to work with those providing care
• Make sure your care is safe and effective, and
• Work effectively with others providing you with care

Others may also need to use records about you to:

• check the quality of care (such as clinical audit)
• protect the health of the public
• keep track of NHS spending
• manage the health service
• help investigate any concerns or complaints you or your family have about your health care
• teach health workers and
• help with research

Some information will be held centrally to be used for statistical purposes.  In these instances, we take strict measures to ensure that individual patients cannot be identified.

We use anonymous information, wherever possible, but on occasions we may use personally confidential information for essential NHS purposes such as research and auditing.  However, this information will only be used with your consent, unless the law requires us to pass on the information.

The legal Part

You have a right to privacy under the UK General Data Protection Regulation 2016 (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018.  The Practice needs your personal, sensitive and confidential data in order perform our statutory health duties, in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller in compliance with Article 6 (e) of the GDPR and for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services on the in compliance with Article 9, (h) of the GDPR.

You have the right to ask for a copy of all records about you.

• Your request should be made to the practice holding your information
• We are required to respond to you within one Month
• You will need to give adequate information (for example full name, address, date of birth NHS number etc.)

To Access your record contact:

If you think anything is inaccurate or incorrect, please inform the Practice as soon as possible. For other rights about the use of your information pleases see our website.

The Practice Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey PCIG Consulting Ltd, and is available via

email: [email protected]

Tel: 07525 623939

Who are our partner organisations?

We may share information with the following main partner organisations:

• NHS England
• Our Commissioners
• NHS Trusts / Organisation (Hospitals, CCG’s)
• Ambulance Service
• Social Services

We may also share your information, with your consent and subject to strict sharing protocols about how it will be used, with:

• Education Services
• Local Authorities
• Voluntary Sector Providers
• Private Sector

Anyone who receives information from us also has a legal duty to:

KEEP IT CONFIDENTIAL!

If you believe the Trust has breached any of your Data Protection Rights.

You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe house
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Tel: 01625 545745
https://ico.org.uk/

January 2024

Information about you is used in a number of ways by the NHS and Social Care services to support your personal care and to improve health and social care services for everyone.

The Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) is the national NHS organisation with a legal responsibility to collect data as people make use of NHS and social care services. The data is used both at a local level and nationally to help with planning, managing your care, supporting research into new treatments, identifying trends and issues and so forth, and is used to try to make services better for all.

You can, however, choose not to have information about you shared or used for any purpose beyond providing your own treatment or care.

Your right to opt out

You can choose not to have anything that could identify you shared beyond your GP practice (Type 1 objection).

You can also choose for the HSCIC not to share information it collects from all health providers any further (previously known as Type 2 objection, now National Data Opt-out).

The National Opt Out

It is a service that enables the public to register to opt out of their confidential patient information being used for purposes beyond their individual care and treatment. It was introduced for the health and social care system in England on 25 May 2018. The public can change their national data opt-out choice at any time via www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters or by calling NHS Digital contact centre on 0300 3035678 or via the NHS App.

National data opt-outs apply to a disclosure when an organisation e.g. a research body confirms they have approval from the Confidentiality Advisory Group (CAG) for the disclosure of confidential patient information held by another organisation responsible for the data (the data controller), such as an NHS Trust or GP practice.

The CAG approval is also known as a section 251 approval and refers to section 251 of the National Health Service Act 2006 and its current Regulations, the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002. The NHS Act 2006 and the Regulations enable the common law duty of confidentiality to be temporarily lifted so that confidential patient information can be disclosed without the data controller being in breach of the common law duty of confidentiality.

In practice, this means that the organisation responsible for the information (the data controller) can, if they wish, disclose the information to the data applicant (e.g. research body) with section 251 approval without being in breach of the common law duty of confidentiality.

National data opt-outs do not apply where:

• information being disclosed is anonymised in accordance with the Information Commissioner’s Office anonymisation code of practice
• the individual has given their consent for their information to be used for a particular purpose, (e.g. a specific research study).
• there is an overriding public interest in the disclosure, (i.e. the public interest in disclosing the data overrides the public interest in maintaining confidentiality), also referred to as the ‘public interest test’.
• there is a legal requirement that sets aside the common law duty of confidentiality or the information is required by a court order

A good example is that for COVID-19 pandemic response there is no right to op-out in which is covered by point 3:-

Patients cannot opt out of receiving COVID related texts, which is explained in the nHSD notice which states:-

What if I have opted-out of my data being used (national data opt-out)?

The national data opt-out does not apply to disclosure of confidential patient information if it is being used to protect public health, for example to:

• diagnose communicable diseases
• control or prevent their spread
• deliver and monitor vaccination programmes
• manage risks of infection from food or water supplies or the environment

Read a full explanation of the lawful basis of such disclosures in 6.2:Communicable diseases and risks to public health in the operational policy guidance document.

As such we can only give assurance that if the Type 1 and National Opt out have been applied by the patient we will respect that in terms of adding the opt-out (type 1) code to the record and this will at system level block inappropriate sharing from the GP system with the limitations above, and if she has applied for the national opt-out NHDS and the hSCIC will not extract data unless:-

• information being disclosed is anonymised in accordance with the Information Commissioner’s Office anonymisation code of practice
• the individual has given their consent for their information to be used for a particular purpose, (e.g. a specific research study).
• there is an overriding public interest in the disclosure, (i.e. the public interest in disclosing the data overrides the public interest in maintaining confidentiality), also referred to as the ‘public interest test’.
• there is a legal requirement that sets aside the common law duty of confidentiality or the information is required by a court order

That is the only assurance we can give.

Opt Out Form

Click here to download the opt out form

You have a right to expect a high standard of care from our practice and we will try at all times to provide this to you.

In order to assist us in this we require that you take responsibility for ensuring that you do not abuse the service. For example, it is your responsibility to ensure that you keep appointments and follow medical advice given.

We aim to treat all our patients courteously at all times and expect our patients to treat our staff in a similarly respectful way.

Rights:

• Patients aged 16 to 75 who have not seen a doctor/nurse in the previous 3 years may request a health check with a HCA.
• Patients aged over 75 and have not seen a doctor/nurse in the previous 12 months may request a health check with a HCA.
• Patients have the right to see their own health records subject to limitations.

Responsibilities:

• Arrive on time for your appointments
• Inform the practice of your intention to cancel an appointment in good time.
• Show the courtesy to staff you would yourself, expect to receive.
• Violent or aggressive patients may be removed from the list and referred to a specialist service.
• All patients are entitled to have a chaperone present for any consultation, examination or procedure where they consider one is required.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice)

Data Protection Privacy Notice for Members of Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) Patient Participation Group (PPG)

Introduction:

This privacy notice lets you know what happens to any personal data that you give to us, or any that we may collect from or about you.

This privacy notice applies to personal information processed by or on behalf of the practice.

This Notice explains.

• Who we are, how we use your information and our Data Protection Officer
• What kinds of personal information about you do we process?
• What are the legal grounds for our processing of your personal information (including when we share it with others)?
• What should you do if your personal information changes?
• For how long your personal information is retained by us?
• What are your rights under data protection laws?

The UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) became law on 24th May 2016. This is a regulation on the protection of confidential and sensitive information. It entered into force in the UK on the 25th May 2018, repealing the Data Protection Act (1998), being supplemented by the Data Protection Act 2018.

For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the UK General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (UK) 2016/679) (the “UKGDPR”), and the Data Protection Act 2018 the practice responsible for your personal data is Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice).

This Notice describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how, in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights.

This Privacy Policy applies to the personal data collected from members of the PPG.

What is the Patient Participation Group (PPG)?

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) has established a PPG to help us to gather views and experiences from people who use our services. The PPG aims to allow our service users to be actively engaged and involved in decision-making to help shape our services and culture, with the aim of supporting high-quality sustainable services.

How we use your information and the law.

Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) will be what’s known as the ‘Controller’ of the personal data you provide to us.  Participation in the PPG is entirely voluntary. If you are interested in joining our PPG, you will need to email [email protected] or speak to a member of staff.

If you have expressed an interest in attending our PPG, we will collect the following information about you:

• Name.
• Contact number.
• Email address.
• Preferred contact method.
• Age.
• Ethnicity; and
• Area in which you live.

Your information will be used to:

• Keep a register of current members.
• Contact you with details of PPG meetings;
• Progress any comments or suggestions; and
• Collect views and experiences from people from a range of equality groups.

You may be asked for your view and experiences in relation to;

• How the Practice can achieve its aims in providing best possible provision to its patients
• What developments in the community that may impact healthcare have occurred
• What other health services are doing and providing feedback to the Practice
• What patients and individuals who have not accessed our services think of the Practice

A standard PPG will be held every two months but we may hold additional PPGs for more bespoke topics. We will tell you whether the PPG will be held in person or via video conference. Where PPGs are held remotely, we will provide you instructions for joining ahead of the meeting.

Each PPG will usually have between 12-15 participants in attendance plus relevant members of the Umbrella Medical management team. Your identity and any views or comments you express at the PPG will therefore be shared with the other attendees.

How do we lawfully use your data?

As a healthcare provider, we are regulated by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and have established our PPG to support us to meet our CQC requirements. Specifically, the PPG assists us in responding to the CQC’s Key Lines of Enquiry relating to ‘well-led’ domain.

The output of the PPG will be used to help influence how we provide our healthcare services which we have been commissioned to provide under the NHS Act 2006 and the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

Article 6 (1) (e) – the processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller.

Article 9 (2) (h) -processing is necessary for…the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services…”

Changing your mind

You can withdraw from the PPG at any time. We will remove your contact details from our PPG register, and you will not receive any further contact relating to our PPG.

If you wish to withdraw from the PPG, please email [email protected] or speak to a member of the management team.

Your Direct Care will not be impacted in any way should you choose not to take part.

How do we maintain the confidentiality of your records? 

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will only use information collected lawfully in accordance with:

• Data Protection Act 2018
• The UK General Data Protection Regulation 2016
• Human Rights Act 1998
• Common Law Duty of Confidentiality
• NHS Codes of Confidentiality, Information Security and Records Management

We will only ever use or pass on information about you if others who 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), where the law requires information to be passed on.

Our practice policy is to respect the privacy of our members and to maintain compliance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and all UK specific Data Protection Requirements. Our policy is to ensure all personal data will be protected.

All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement.

Where do we store your information electronically?

All the personal data we process is processed in the UK however for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance this information may be located on servers within the European Union.

No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so, and appropriate safeguards have been put in place.  We have a Data Protection regime in place to oversee the effective and secure processing of your personal and or special category (sensitive, confidential) data.

Who are our partner organisations?

We may also have to share your information, subject to strict agreements on how it will be used, with the following organisations;

• NHS Commissioning Support Units
• Clinical Commissioning Groups
• NHS England (NHSE) and NHS Digital (NHSD)
• Local Authorities
• CQC
• Private Sector Providers providing employment services
• Other ‘data processors’ which you will be informed of

You will be informed who your data will be shared with and in some cases asked for consent for this happen when this is required.

We may also use external companies to process personal information, such as for archiving purposes. These companies are bound by contractual agreements to ensure information is kept confidential and secure.  All employees and sub-contractors engaged by our practice are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. If a sub-contractor acts as a data processor for Umbrella Medical [Hatherton Medical Centre, Holland Park Surgery, Mossley Fields Surgery and Broadway Medical Centre] (the Practice) an appropriate contract (art 24-28) will be established for the processing of your information.

How long will we store your information?

We are required under UK tax law to keep your information and data for the full retention periods as specified by NHS England, which currently is up to 6 years.

How can you access, amend move the personal data that you have given to us?

Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise.

Right to object: If we are using your data because we deem it necessary for our legitimate interests to do so, and you do not agree, you have the right to object. We will respond to your request within 1 Month (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases). Generally, we will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply.

Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example for a research project), or consent to market to you, you may withdraw your consent at any time.

Right to erasure: In certain situations (for example, where we have processed your data unlawfully), you have the right to request us to “erase” your personal data. We will respond to your request within 30 days (although we may be allowed to extend this period in certain cases) and will only disagree with you if certain limited conditions apply. If we do agree to your request, we will Delete your data but will generally assume that you would prefer us to keep a note of your name on our register of individuals who would prefer not to be contacted. That way, we will minimise the chances of you being contacted in the future where your data are collected in unconnected circumstances. If you would prefer us not to do this, you are free to say so.

Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your data from us to another data controller.

Access to your personal information 

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You have a right under the Data Protection legislation to request access to view or to obtain copies of what information the surgery holds about you and to have it amended should it be inaccurate. To request this, you need to do the following:

• Your request should be made in writing to the Practice
• There is no charge to have a copy of the information held about you
• We are required to respond to you within one month

What should you do if your personal information changes?

You should tell us so that we can update our records please contact the Practice Manager as soon as any of your details change, this is especially important for changes of address or contact details (such as your mobile phone number), the practice will from time to time ask you to confirm that the information we currently hold is accurate and up to date.

Objections / Complaints

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed at the Surgeryt, please contact the GP Practice Manager or the Data Protection Officer as above. If you are still unhappy following a review by the GP practice, you have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You have a right to complain to the UK supervisory Authority as below.

Information Commissioner:

Wycliffe house, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

Tel: 01625 545745

https://ico.org.uk/

If you are happy for your data to be extracted and used for the purposes described in this privacy notice, then you do not need to do anything.  If you have any concerns about how your data is shared, then please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

If you would like to know more about your rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as below.

Data Protection Officer:

The Practice Data Protection Officer is Paul Couldrey of PCIG Consulting Limited. Any queries in regard to Data Protection issues should be addressed to him at: –

Email: [email protected]

Postal: PCIG Consulting Limited, 7 Westacre Drive, Quarry Bank, Dudley, West Midlands, DY5 2EE

Changes:

It is important to point out that we may amend this Privacy Notice from time to time.  If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of our Privacy Notice, please contact the Practice Data Protection Officer.

You have the right to know what information we hold about you. If you would like to see your records, please speak to the locality manager or reception staff who will be able to provide you with information on how to do this, and any charges that may be applicable.

A Summary Care Record is a way of telling health and care staff important information about a person.

Read this easy read photo story about adding additional information to your summary care record.

It tells staff caring for someone about their medicines and allergies.  This means they can look after the person if they are not at their usual doctor’s surgery.

For people with a learning disability, autism or both a doctor might ask if they can add some additional information to the summary care record. This will mean if a person needs treatment by other services like emergency or urgent care they will have more information about them.

More information about the Summary Care Record, including an easy read leaflet, is available on the NHS Digital website.

Information for health professionals

You can help people with a learning disability by asking if you can add additional information to their summary care record.

Any information from the person’s GP record which could help staff support the person better will be automatically added.  This could be things like how they want to be communicated with or any reasonable adjustments that need to be made.

To make sure other NHS services can access this information you need to opt in to adding additional information to the Summary Care Record. There is a question on the annual health check national template to encourage more people to agree to having additional information added to their Summary Care Record.

More information for GPs about using summary care records to make more information available in care settings is available on the NHS Digital website.

Opting out

The purpose of SCR is to improve the care that you receive, however, if you don’t want to have an SCR you have the option to opt out. If this is your preference please inform your GP or fill in an SCR opt-out form and return it to your GP practice.

Regardless of your past decisions about your Summary Care Record consent preferences, you can change your mind at any time. You can choose any of the following options:

1. To have a Summary Care Record with Additional Information shared. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see a enriched Summary Care Record if they need to provide you with direct care.
2. To have a Summary Care Record with core information only. This means that any authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals will be able to see information about allergies and medications only in your Summary Care Record if they need to provide you with direct care.
3. To opt-out of having a Summary Care Record altogether. This means that you do not want any information shared with other authorised, registered and regulated health and care professionals involved in your direct care, including in an emergency.

To make these changes, you should inform your GP practice or complete the SCR patient consent preferences form and return it to your GP practice.

Umbrella Medical has a Zero Tolerance Policy towards aggressive behaviour.

Shouting, swearing or being abusive will not be tolerated under ANY circumstances.

Patients who display any of the following behaviour could be asked to leave the premises and could be removed from our patient list:

• Using bad language or swearing
• Acting in a physically aggressive or intimidating way
• Verbal abuse towards the staff in any form including insulting the staff
• Racial abuse and sexual harassment
• Abuse related to a person’s religion, sexuality, gender, age or disability
• Any physical violence
• Persistent or unrealistic demands that causes stress to staff
• Causing damage or stealing from the Practice’s premises, staff or patients
• Obtaining drugs and/or medical services fraudulently
• Any other episode in which an employee is abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances relating to their work

We are here to help and aim to be as polite as possible, even during difficult times.

We are a Zero tolerance practice and do not tolerate any form of verbal or physical abuse, bullying or any other form of intimidation. Any patient displaying behaviour of this nature towards staff, doctors or other patients, will be removed from the list with immediate effect, and if appropriate the matter will be reported to the police & the Black Country ICB.