SCR opt-out letters would confuse

Tags: Londonwide LMCs website

15 Mar 2010

The summary care record roll out

The risk that patients would misread opt-out forms for the Summary Care Record and send them to the wrong address has led to them being excluded from patient information packs, Connecting for Health has told GPs.

Dr Gillian Braunold, clinical director for the SCR and HealthSpace, has written an open letter to GPs following the recent criticism of the SCR roll-out and a call from the BMA for the roll-out to be suspended.

Dr Braunold’s letter covers concerns raised by the BMA and others since the SCR began to be rolled out across five strategic health authorities and emphasises that no practice will begin SCR creation without the practice’s full agreement.

Dr Braunold’s letter says the information sent to patients includes a pre-paid envelope and order form for patients to request additional information. She states that early adopters found that patients misread the opt-out form and filled in everything, including the opt-out form, and sent it back in the pre-paid envelope when that is not what they wanted.

It adds: “Most importantly though the opt-out forms must be returned to the GP practice and there is a significant risk that those patients who want to opt out complete the opt out form and include in the pre-paid envelope which then would not be sent to the GP practice to be acted on accordingly.”

Dr Braunold‘s letter emphasises that the 12 week period allowed before SCRs are created is a minimum period. Her letter adds: “In many cases practices will not go live immediately after the 12 week period but sometime after when they have received the appropriate training and software upgrade.”

The emphasis on the 12 week consultation period as a minimum period is also included in new advice issued by Londonwide LMCs at the end of last week which it says has the support of CfH.

The LMCs’ guidance states that the approach practices take to uploading records must balance a practice’s confidence about patients' level of awareness and access to key patient information and the risk of uploading data.

It adds: “The risks to be balanced are a) the risk you carry when a patient who had the opportunity to have data uploaded was denied the benefit of that upload during an emergency against b) the risk you carry when a patient is denied the autonomy to opt-out of a data upload when you are in a position of control over that data.”

The LMC guidance adds: “It therefore follows that spending a reasonable period of time ensuring you are confident that your patients’ awareness has been amply raised and your risks have been balanced is an appropriate approach to take.”

Dr Braunold letter to GPs adds: “I am personally encouraged by the increasing benefit that the SCR is brining, particularly to GP out of hours with more than 10,000 SCRs used to date in those settings.”

CfH’s website said this week that it is expecting that a meeting will be held with the BMA to discuss the concerns raised in the association’s letter to the minister on the SCR.

A spokesperson for CfH told EHI Primary Care: “The minister regularly meets the BMA and no doubt this will be discussed at the next meeting.”

Fiona Barr

Reader's Comments

SCR letters

16 Mar 10 21:03

Why would opt out letters confuse patients?

All it needs is one simple question and one simple answer, 'do you want your medical records on the SCR system' ....

How stupid do these folk think we are? The NHS has a duty to explain, how would they like their bank details placed on a national system to make banking easier?

I opted out two years ago and have forbidden any part of my medical records ot be transferred without my consent.

It is wrong to assume we all agree; it will not be long, having pursuaded many to agree with an array of wonderful promises, that other agencies will be given access to those records.

I have a mental health problem and the greatest source of stigma is via the NHS.

Unconcisous pateints are treated without any information about them being available so why do we need prying staff rooting through our medical history and personal details?

The NHS want all doctors under their control and all our personal details in their hands so that they can use them as they wish.

You can purchase a copy of the National Census so how long will it be before the public can purchase a copy of our medical records?

You have been warned!

Risk assessment

16 Mar 10 21:03

Risk balancing.... "The risk that patients would misread opt-out forms for the Summary Care Record and send them to the wrong address " as opposed to the CfH agency sending them to the wrong address or putting two in the same envelope?

What can they explain?

17 Mar 10 10:03

If they can't explain how to send the opt out form in a manner that people can understand how can they hope to explain the complexities of the pros and cons of having a Summary Care Record?

why there is no opt out form included

23 Mar 10 19:03

Dear all the whole point of piloting is to learn from those experiences and apply the learning to the wider roll out. In the early adopter period we had ample experience of the envelopes ,whichare clearly marked do NOT use for opt out forms or other material and if other material is sent it will be destroye, these were still used by many to ask for repeat scripts and by others to send opt out forms they had downloaded from the web. It is very simplistic to assume that everyone in the population is the same and reads things to the same degree. A risk assessment demonstrated it is safer not to include the forms if they were likely to end up in the wrong place to a larger number if they were included. If they were to be sent to a central point then GPs would not have the confidence they require of seeing on their system that the patients wishes had been carried out to ensure nothing flows to SCR from their system ( all this is in my open letter to profession) Gillian Braunold Clinical Director SCR