During the COVID-19 pandemic there will be emergency powers exercised by the Secretary of State outlining changes to the Summary Care Record (SCR) and implementation of GPConnect. These changes will remain in place until the expiry date of the notice – currently 30 September, 2020.
GPConnect will allow authorised health and care professionals working in primary care, NHS 111 – including the Covid-19 Clinical Assessment Service – and other appropriate direct care settings access to the GP records of the patients that they treat. It will also allow NHS 111 to book appointments directly with the GP practice. If a patient has opted-out of sharing their GP record, this decision will be upheld and the patient’s data will not be shared via GPConnect.
Additional information of a SCR will now be automatically included in all patient SCRs, unless a patient has expressed a preference not to include it, to provide health and care professionals with faster access to more information about the patients that they are treating. A patient can opt-out of having a SCR or opt-out of additional information being included in the SCR. To do so, they will need to complete a form. The revised Covid -19 Patient Privacy Notice can be found here.