New contractual requirements came into force from 1 April 2014 requiring that GP Practices should make available a statement of intent in relation to the following IT developments:

• Summary Care Record (SCR)
• GP to GP Record Transfers
• Patient Online Access to Their GP Record
• Data for commissioning and other secondary care purposes

The same contractual obligations require that we have a statement of intent regarding these developments in place and publicised by 30 September 2014.

Please find below details of the practices stance with regards to these points.

Summary Care Record (SCR)

Your Summary Care Record is a short summary of your GP medical records. It tells other health and care staff that care for you about the medicines you take and your allergies.

At a minimum, the SCR holds important information about;

• current medication
• allergies and details of any previous bad reactions to medicines
• the name, address, date of birth and NHS number of the patient

Access to SCR information means that care in other settings is safer, reducing the risk of prescribing errors. It also helps avoid delays to urgent care.

If you are registered with a GP practice in England your SCR is created automatically, unless you have opted out. 98% of practices are now using the system. You can talk to the practice about including additional information to do with long term conditions, care preferences or specific communications needs.

You can add more information to your SCR by asking your doctor. They can add extra details from your medical notes, including:

• health problems like dementia or diabetes
• details of your carer
• your treatment preferences
• communication needs, for example if you have hearing difficulties or need an interpreter

GP to GP Record Transfers

NHS England require practices to utilise the GP2GP facility for the transfer of patient records between practices, when a patient registers or de-registers (not for temporary registration).
It is very important that you are registered with a doctor at all times. If you leave your GP and register with a new GP, your medical records will be removed from your previous doctor and forwarded on to your new GP via NHS England. It can take your paper records up to two weeks to reach your new surgery.

With GP to GP record transfers your electronic record is transferred to your new practice much sooner.

The practice confirms that GP to GP transfers are already active and we send and receive patient records via this system.

Patient Online Access to Their GP Record

NHS England requires practices to promote and offer the facility to enable patients online access to appointments, prescriptions, allergies and adverse reactions.

We currently offer the facility for cancelling appointments and also for ordering your repeat prescriptions and viewing a summary of your medical records on-line. If you do not already have a user name and password for this system – please register your interest with our reception staff.  If you require access to your records on line please ask at reception for a request form. This will be agreed by the GP.

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.

Patients can find out more and set their opt-out choice at nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters.