Access to Medical Records

Your medical record is an integral part of your healthcare and every patient that registers at the practice will have one. As a paperlight accredited practice the medical records that we hold on each patient is now an electronic record held on our clinical computer system. Each time you have a consultation or we receive information about you the medical record is updated to reflect this allowing the most up to date information to be available at all times.

The medical record is accessed by clinical and administrative staff working at the practice, of which all staff are duty bound under the codes of confidentiality. For further information on medical record confidentiality, please read our Confidentiality Statement. We may on occasion share information we hold about you with other allied health care professionals involved in your care such as hospital clinicians if we refer you to secondary care etc. Your medical records will not be disclosed to any other third party without your prior consent. If you would like to consent to a third party accessing your medical records please read the relevant section below.

Caldicott Guardian

The practice will always have a senior member of staff acting as the Caldicott Guardian in order to maintain confidentiality of patient and service user information and enabling appropriate information sharing. For further information, please visit the Health and Social Care Information Centre’s Caldicott Guardian page.

Data Protection

The medical records we hold fully comply with the Data Protection Act. The medical records will only be accessed for the benefit of your healthcare and will be accessed by staff that are involved in providing that care. The data controller for the practice is the senior partner. For further information on Data Protection, please visit the Health and Social Care Information Centre’s Data Protection Act page.

Access to Medical Records Act

Under the Access to Medical Records Act, patients are able to access their medical records. In order to access your records a written request must be made to the practice together with the fee to provide this service. To find out the current fee please contact the practice.

For further information on Medical Records Act, please visit the Government’s legislation website to read more about the Access to Medical Records Act.

NHS National Summary Care Record (SCR)

The NHS National Summary Care Record programme will allow some of the medical record we hold about a patient to be shared with our allied health professionals such as hospital clinicians, district nurses etc.  For more information on Summary Care Records, please read our National Care Record page.

If you have any queries regarding your personal medical record please do not hesitate to contact the practice staff or via our online contact form.

Allowing consent to a third party

If you would like to give consent to another party to access information about you, for example your partner, relative, carer, solicitor etc please download and complete our Third Party Access Form. This form must be returned by you to the practice in person to validate your identity and ensure security of your medical record.