NHS24 to get access to emergency care records

Scotland is to allow NHS24 access to emergency care summaries of patients’ GP records from June, subject to explicit consent when patients call the healthcare helpline.

The extension of the Emergency Care Summary (ECS) project to NHS24 will coincide with the completion of the rollout of the project across Scotland in June when the summaries of all five million people in Scotland will be available to view.

Dr Kenneth Robertson, clinical lead for IM&T in the Scottish Executive Health Department, said all callers to NHS24 will be asked whether their ECS can be accessed and consent status recorded on the NHS24 IT system

Dr Robertson told EHI Primary Care: “This will have a profound impact on the number of accesses to the ECS and we are quite excited about it as we expect to see a large benefit in terms of alleviating some of the clinical risk that exist when patients are seen by emergency and out-of-hours services.”

The ECS is an extract from GPs’ records held on central data repositories and containing demographic information plus data on current and repeat medication and allergies. So far it has only been available to GPs’ working in out-of-hours centres but agreement has now been reached to extend the project to NHS24 with access by accident and emergency departments to follow and also possibly ambulance services.

The ECS project has received approval from all the major GP bodies in Scotland and operates on a two stage consent model. Information is uploaded to the central data repositories on implied consent, with a publicity campaign offering patients the opportunity to opt-out, and data is then only viewed by clinicians with explicit consent.

So far 3.5 million records have been uploaded, with another 1.5 million to be added by June. Only 22 people have opted out.

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Emergency care summary set to roll out in Scotland