Practice Policies
Confidentiality and Medical Records
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.
Freedom of Information
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.
Access to Records
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. No information will be released without the patient consent unless we are legally obliged to do so.
Did Not Attend Appointment – DNA
A Did Not Attend (DNA) occurs when an appointment is not attended and the Patient has not contacted the Practice in advance to cancel it or where the cancellation is so late as to make it impossible to allocate that time to another Patient who needs treatment.
If a patient fails to attend a pre-booked appointment on 3 occasions, or more, within a rolling 12 month period, they could risk removal from the practice. The first DNA will be followed by an informal text message with a link to a questionnaire as to why they DNA’d. responses will be saved to the patients record. Following this there will be one more warning sent out to the patient before the final warning. The third and final letter warning will be by letter.
All messages and letters are valued for a period of months from the most recent DNA communication. Removal will be based on warnings greater than 12 months old will be invailed, in this case a further formal warning and a period of grace will be required.
