Practice Policies

In accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998 and Access to Health Records Act, patients may request to see their medical records. Such requests should be made through the practice manager and may be subject to an administration charge. Please send request to [email protected]

No information will be released without the patient consent unless we are legally obliged to do so

Patient Feedback

We welcome patient feedback and ask that if you have a positive experience of the Practice that you take the time to leave feedback on the NHS Choices website at www.nhs.uk.

Complaints

We make every effort to give the best possible service to everyone who attends our Practice.

However we are aware that things can go wrong resulting in a patient feeling that they have a genuine cause for complaint. If this is so, we would wish for the matter to be resolved as quickly and as amicably as is possible.

If you have any concerns then please contact the Practice Manager in the first instance who will deal with them appropriately. For written information regarding the complaints procedure detailed below please ask at reception.

Alconbury & Brampton Surgeries

Patient Complaints Leaflet

If you have a complaint or concern about the service you have received from the doctors or any of the staff working in this practice, please let us know. We operate a practice complaints procedure as part of a NHS system for dealing with complaints.

Our complaints system meets national criteria as laid down by the NHS.

How to Complain

We hope that most problems can be sorted out easily and quickly, often at the time they arise and directly with the person concerned. If your problem cannot be resolved in this way and you wish to make a complaint, we would like you to let us know as soon as possible – ideally within a matter of days or at most a few weeks – because this will enable us to establish what happened more easily. If it is not possible to do this, please let us have details of your complaint:

Within 12 months of the incident that is the cause of the problem; or

Within 12 months of discovering that you have a problem,

Complaining on behalf of someone else. Please note that we keep strictly to the rules of patient medical confidentiality. If you are complaining on behalf of someone else, we have to be assured that you have his or her permission to do so. A note signed by the patient concerned will be needed, unless they are incapable (because of illness) of providing this.

What You Should do

Complaints should be addressed to the Practice Manager, Melanie Gearing.

Telephone: 01480 890281 Email: [email protected]

Alternatively, you may ask for an appointment with the Practice Manager in order to discuss your concerns. The Practice Manager will explain the complaints procedure to you and will make sure your concerns are dealt with promptly. It will be a great help if you are as specific as possible about your complaint.

Our Commitment to You

We shall acknowledge your complaint within three working days and aim to have looked into your complaint within the time scale agreed with you.  The time taken to investigate your complaint will depend on its complexity and the number of people involved. We shall then be in a position to offer you an explanation, or a meeting if that is more appropriate.

When we look into your complaint, we aim to:

Find out what happened and what should have happened.

Make it possible for you to discuss the problem with those concerned if this is your wish.

Ensure the complaint is resolved to your satisfaction.

Make sure you receive an apology, where this is appropriate.

Identify what needs to be done to ensure the problem does not arise again.

Our Principles Are

To get it right

To be patient focussed

To be open and accountable

To act fairly and proportionately

To put things right

To seek continuous improvement

Complaining to NHS England

We hope that, if you have a problem, you will use our practice complaints procedure to ensure it is resolved. We believe this will give us the best chance of putting right whatever has gone wrong and an opportunity to improve our practice. This however does not affect your right to approach NHS England if you feel you cannot raise your complaint with us.

In this instance you should contact:

NHS England, PO Box 16738, Redditch, B97 9PT

Telephone:  0300 311 22 33  Email: [email protected]

Complaining to the NHS Ombudsman

If your complaint is not resolved by the Practice it can be referred to The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. All records will have to be provided to the Ombudsman to assist with the resolution of your complaint. They can be contacted by;

Telephone: 0345 015 4033 or email: [email protected] or in writing to: The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Millbank Tower, Millbank, London, SW1P 4QP or via the website: www.ombudsman.org.uk.

The ICS Patient Experience Team

For support and help regarding issues with other NHS organisations, The Patient Experience Team provides

Advice and support to patients, their families and carers

Information on NHS services

Listens to concerns, suggestions or queries

Help to sort out problems quickly.

If you would like to talk to someone in the PET, the telephone number for Cambridgeshire is:

0800 279 2535 or email: [email protected]

Patient Experience Team, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough ICS, Lockton House, Clarendon Road, Cambridge. CB2 8FH

ICAS

For information and help in making a complaint you can contact POhWER who are and Independent Complaints Advocacy Service (ICAS) at Unit 26A, E Space North, 181 Wisbech Road, Littleport, Cambs. CB6 1RA. Helpline number is 0845 4561084.

CQC

The CQC does not manage individual complaints about GPs and their Services. However you can find out more about making a complaint from the CQC website: www.cqc.org.uk

HEALTHWATCH – Cambridgeshire Healthwatch are contactable at: [email protected]

The practice complies with data protection and access to medical records legislation. Identifiable information about you will be shared with others in the following circumstances:

To provide further medical treatment for you e.g. from district nurses and hospital services.

To help you get other services e.g. from the social work department. This requires your consent.

When we have a duty to others e.g. in child protection cases. Anonymised patient information will also be used at local and national level to help the Health Board and Government plan services e.g. for diabetic care.

If you do not wish anonymous information about you to be used in such a way, please let us know.

Reception and administration staff require access to your medical records in order to do their jobs. These members of staff are bound by the same rules of confidentiality as the medical staff.

General Practice Data for Planning and Research (GPDPR) Update August 2021

In July we advised patients about a new NHS Digital framework for data extraction called GDPR which planned for safe and secure access to GP Practices in England to collect data in order to analyse and publish statistical data to be used for health and social  care purposes. This data will inform the planning & commissioning of services, policy development and be used for public health purposes and research.

Following concerns raised in response to the Department of Health and Social Care initial plans for NHS Digital to upload GP data to their central database the implementation of this data collection has been postponed.

NHS Digital are working with the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) and the British medical Association (BMA) to revise their plans with the following assurances;

Patient data will be deleted if a patient opts-out of sharing their patient data with NHS Digital at any time, even if this is after it has been uploaded. Patients can opt in or out at any stage and the data held will reflect their current decision;

The back-log or opt-out requests recently received has been cleared so that all current preferences are recorded;

A Trusted Research Environment (TRE) will be developed and implemented at NHS Digital solely for the purpose of storing this data which is to be used for the purpose of improving health and care only. All data will be pseudonymised and encrypted by the GP clinical system prior to transfer to NHS Digital and is not and never will be ‘for sale’;

Patients are made aware of the scheme via an initial consultation with a further engagement and communication campaign.

There is no longer a specific start date for the collection of data as this process will not commence until the above assurances have been met. In addition to this NHS Digital are working on a process that enables patients to opt out centrally.

The value and importance of the data upload programme is undeniable given the recent achievements made during the Covid-19 pandemic. Neither the discovery that the steroid Dexamethasone could save the lives of a third of the most vulnerable patients on ventilators or the speed of the vaccine rollout in the UK would have been possible without data from GP Practices.

We would like to reassure patients at the Practice that if you have previously registered a type 1 opt-out to decline the upload of data to NHS Digital then this still stands. As more information becomes available from NHS Digital we will share these with our patients.

Melanie Gearing

Practice Manager

Information about the General Practioners and the practice required for disclosure under this act can be made available to the public. All requests for such information should be made to the practice manager.

From 1st September 2021 Alconbury & Brampton Surgeries, like all GP surgeries, will legally have to allow sharing of patient identifiable data with NHS digital for health and social care planning and research purposes. We are not allowed by law to refuse to share the information.

NHS Digital will also collect information from other healthcare providers, and will be able to publish and share this data. NHS Digital hope to use this data to help NHS planning of local services and to share with research organisations.

You can find out more about how and why NHS Digital want to use your data here: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/data-collections-and-data-sets/data-collections/general-practice-data-for-planning-and-research#additional-information-for-patients-and-the-public

As a patient you can decide whether or not you wish your data to be shared, and you can tell us not to share your data with NHS Digital.

It is important for you to understand there are two different opt out options:

Option 1 – Known as a Type 1 Opt out:

This is to opt out of GP data sharing with GDPR.

Your information will not be shared from our clinical system.

If you opt out before the end of August 2021, NHS Digital will not extract any of your data.

You can opt out at a later stage, and no further data extractions will then take place.

You can opt in again at any stage.

You can use this online form to indicate your type 1 opt out: https://www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters/manage-your-choice/

You will find the relevant paper forms here (and shortly on our website too): https://digital.nhs.uk/your-data/opting-out-of-data-sharing

You can email or write to us at [email protected] clearly stating you wish to record a Type 1 opt out.

Option 2 – Known as National Data Opt out:

This does not stop sharing from GP records to NHS Digital.

This controls what NHS Digital is allowed to do with your data, you are opting out of NHS Digital sharing your health data (this includes any health data from other providers as well).

There are several ways to compete the National Data opt out:

Via the NHS App

By calling 0300 303 5678

Online at: https://www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters/manage-your-choice/

In July we advised patients about a new NHS Digital framework for data extraction called GDPR which planned for safe and secure access to GP Practices in England to collect data in order to analyse and publish statistical data to be used for health and social  care purposes.

This data will inform the planning & commissioning of services, policy development and be used for public health purposes and research.

Following concerns raised in response to the Department of Health and Social Care initial plans for NHS Digital to upload GP data to their central database the implementation of this data collection has been postponed.

NHS Digital are working with the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) and the British medical Association (BMA) to revise their plans with the following assurances;

Patient data will be deleted if a patient opts-out of sharing their patient data with NHS Digital at any time, even if this is after it has been uploaded. Patients can opt in or out at any stage and the data held will reflect their current decision;

The back-log or opt-out requests recently received has been cleared so that all current preferences are recorded;

A Trusted Research Environment (TRE) will be developed and implemented at NHS Digital solely for the purpose of storing this data which is to be used for the purpose of improving health and care only. All data will be pseudonymised and encrypted by the GP clinical system prior to transfer to NHS Digital and is not and never will be ‘for sale’;

Patients are made aware of the scheme via an initial consultation with a further engagement and communication campaign.

There is no longer a specific start date for the collection of data as this process will not commence until the above assurances have been met.

In addition to this NHS Digital are working on a process that enables patients to opt out centrally.

The value and importance of the data upload programme is undeniable given the recent achievements made during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Neither the discovery that the steroid Dexamethasone could save the lives of a third of the most vulnerable patients on ventilators or the speed of the vaccine rollout in the UK would have been possible without data from GP Practices.

We would like to reassure patients at the Practice that if you have previously registered a type 1 opt-out to decline the upload of data to NHS Digital then this still stands. As more information becomes available from NHS Digital we will share these with our patients.

Melanie Gearing

Practice Manager

Online Access to Your Medical Record

From 31st March 2016 online access to medical records must provide patients with access to all coded information held within their record.  We will be working with our clinical supplier and NHS England to prepare for this and ensure the service is in place by that date.

We currently offer patients the opportunity to book appointments and request repeat medication online. If you are a Brampton patient and opt to request repeat prescriptions this way then please allow an extra day for us to action this for you as requests are processed by our Dispensary at Alconbury and dispatched to Brampton via our internal mail.

Patients who wish to have online access to repeat prescriptions and appointment booking need to request this from reception who can generate a letter detailing the login information they will need to access these services. Proof of residency address and photo ID are required.

We have also recently commenced with the offering of patients online access to summary information from their medical records. This includes your demographics, medications, immunisations and allergies.

Patients that wish to have online access to their records will need to complete a form to request this, have read and understood their responsibilities as a patient as detailed in the leaflet ‘it’s your choice’ and will be asked to provide photographic identification as proof of identity.

Our online services for patients are accessed via the partnership website  https://www.patientaccess.com/gp-features.

Our Supplementary Privacy Notice on Covid-19 for Patients/Service Users can be found under our the our documents page.

The Practice Privacy Notice can be found under the our documents page.

National Data Opt Out

Patients can choose to opt out of their data being used for research and planning purposes. For more information visit: https://www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters/.

Summary Care Record

There is a new Central NHS Computer System called the Summary Care Record (SCR). The Summary Care Record is meant to help emergency doctors and nurses help you when you contact them when the surgery is closed. Initially, it will contain just your medications and allergies.

Later on as the central NHS computer system develops, (known as the ‘Summary Care Record’ – SCR), other staff who work in the NHS will be able to access it along with information from hospitals, out of hours services, and specialists letters that may be added as well.

Your information will be extracted from practices such as ours and held on central NHS databases.

As with all new systems there are pros and cons to think about. When you speak to an emergency doctor you might overlook something that is important and if they have access to your medical record it might avoid mistakes or problems, although even then, you should be asked to give your consent each time a member of NHS Staff wishes to access your record, unless you are medically unable to do so.

On the other hand, you may have strong views about sharing your personal information and wish to keep your information at the level of this practice. Connecting for Health (CfH), the government agency responsible for the Summary Care Record have agreed with doctors’ leaders that new patients registering with this practice should be able to decide whether or not their information is uploaded to the Central NHS Computer System.

For existing patients it is different in that it is assumed that you want your record uploaded to the Central NHS Computer System unless you actively opt out.

For further information visit the Connecting for Health Website

If you choose to opt out of the scheme, then you will need to complete a form and bring it along to the surgery.

Communication from the Health and Social Care Information Centre about opt-outs and your care information choices.

This information below can also be found at http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/thenhs/records/healthrecords/Pages/overview.aspx

Sharing Your Records: Your Personal Information

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. You can also choose for the HSCIC not to share information it collects from all health providers any further.

If you have previously told your GP practice that you don’t want the HSCIC to share your personal confidential information for purposes other than your own care and treatment, your opt-out will have been implemented by the HSCIC from April 29 2016. It will remain in place unless you change it.

Simply contact your GP either to register an opt-out or end an opt-out you have already registered and they will update your medical record. Your GP practice will also be able to confirm whether or not you have registered an opt-out in the past.

You can find more information about how the HSCIC handles your information and choices and how it manages your opt-out on the HSCIC websitewww.hscic.gov.uk/yourinfo

Information Sharing

The HSCIC has a statutory role to collect and process health and social care information which is set out in the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

The HSCIC fair processing materials, available at http://www.hscic.gov.uk/patientconf, explain and provide further information on:

• What HSCIC collects – the types of information the HSCIC collects and what it’s used for.

• Personal information choices – people’s rights regarding care information.

• Information requests from organisations – how organisations can ask HSCIC to collect or provide access to care information.

• Assurance bodies and processes – how the information requests HSCIC receive are carefully looked at.

• Examples of benefits that have been realised through the provision of such information including case studies involving breast cancer and diabetes that are available at: http://www.hscic.gov.uk/benefitscasestudies/extracts.

The HSCIC is absolutely committed to keeping all of the data it handles safe and secure and applies the same principle to any data that is released outside of the organisation.

Information is only ever shared with organisations that have gone through a strict application process, who can demonstrate they have a legitimate reason to access the data to use it for the benefit of health and care purposes, as per the new protections introduced as part of the Care Act 2014, and who have signed a legally binding agreement. So for example commercial companies cannot receive information for insurance or marketing purposes.

As part of the application process the Data Access Advisory Group, an independent group, hosted by the HSCIC, considers all applications for data that are identifiable or de-identified for limited access.

The HSCIC also regularly publishes a register of data releases at: http://www.hscic.gov.uk/dataregister, showing where data has been released, to which organisation and for which purposes.

If you require any further information the HSCIC can be contacted by email at [email protected] or by phone on 0300 303 5678.

The NHS operate a zero tolerance policy with regard to violence and abuse and the practice has the right to remove violent patients from the list with immediate effect in order to safeguard practice staff, patients and other persons.

Violence in this context includes actual or threatened physical violence or verbal abuse which leads to fear for a person’s safety. In this situation we will notify the patient in writing of their removal from the list and record in the patient’s medical records the fact of the removal and the circumstances leading to it.

Covid-19 and your information – Updated on 8th April 2020

Alconbury and Brampton Surgeries Supplementary Privacy Note on Covid-19 for Patients/Service Users

This notice describes how we may use your information to protect you and others during the Covid-19 outbreak. It supplements our main Privacy Notice which is available here.

The health and social care system is facing significant pressures due to the Covid-19 outbreak. Health and care information is essential to deliver care to individuals, to support health and social care services and to protect public health. Information will also be vital in researching, monitoring, tracking and managing the outbreak. In the current emergency it has become even more important to share health and care information across relevant organisations.

Existing law which allows confidential patient information to be used and shared appropriately and lawfully in a public health emergency is being used during this outbreak. Using this law the Secretary of State has required NHS Digital; NHS England and Improvement; Arms Length Bodies (such as Public Health England); local authorities; health organisations and GPs 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 the data. Further information is available on gov.uk here and some FAQs on this law are available here.

During this period of emergency, opt-outs will not generally apply to the data used to support the Covid-19 outbreak, due to the public interest in sharing information. This includes National Data Opt-outs. However in relation to the Summary Care Record, existing choices will be respected. Where data is used and shared under these laws your right to have personal data erased will also not apply. It may also take us longer to respond to Subject Access requests, Freedom of Information requests and new opt-out requests whilst we focus our efforts on responding to the outbreak.

In order to look after your health and care needs we may share your confidential patient information including health and care records with clinical and non clinical staff in other health and care providers, for example neighbouring GP practices, hospitals and NHS 111. We may also use the details we have to send public health messages to you, either by phone, text or email.

During this period of emergency we may offer you a consultation via telephone or video-conferencing. By accepting the invitation and entering the consultation you are consenting to this. Your personal/confidential patient information will be safeguarded in the same way it would with any other consultation.

We will also be required to share personal/confidential patient information with health and care organisations and other bodies engaged in disease surveillance for the purposes of

protecting public health, providing healthcare services to the public and monitoring and

managing the outbreak. Further information about how health and care data is being used and shared by other NHS and social care organisations in a variety of ways to support the Covid-19 response is here.

NHS England and Improvement and NHSX have developed a single, secure store to gather data from across the health and care system to inform the Covid-19 response. This includes data already collected by NHS England, NHS Improvement, Public Health England and NHS Digital. New data will include 999 call data, data about hospital occupancy and A&E capacity data as well as data provided by patients themselves. All the data held in the platform is subject to strict controls that meet the requirements of data protection legislation.

In such circumstances where you tell us you’re experiencing Covid-19 symptoms we may need to collect specific health data about you. Where we need to do so, we will not collect more information than we require and we will ensure that any information collected is treated with the appropriate safeguards.

We may amend this privacy notice at any time so please review it frequently. The date at the top of this page will be amended each time this notice is updated.