Data Sharing Review

[Ian Batten]

On 18 Jul 08, at 0929, PeteM wrote:
>
> Do you mean you would like this USB stick to be the *only* copy of  
> your medical notes?

As a complete entity?  Yes.  Or let me rephrase that: it should, at my  
option, be the only copy of my records available without a warrant.     
If there's a need to keep an escrow'd copy accessible only by court  
order then that's one thing, but what Mr Hansen would refer to as  
``the medical bods'' want my records to be available to everyone who  
works for the NHS, its suppliers, its friends and people who doctors  
meet in pubs.

> That is not possible: each practitioner who deals with you has a  
> right to keep a copy of the encounter in order to protect his *own*  
> interests.

That's fine.  He can keep records of his own encounter.  And if really  
bad legal stuff happens, he can perhaps get an escrow'd copy of other  
encounters as part of the legal process.

> He may need to defend himself in a negligence suit you bring against  
> him. He may be audited by the NHS Counter Fraud people to ensure  
> that he hasn't been forging his quality of service claims, or  
> writing phoney prescriptions for you that he then gives to somebody  
> else.

The first case may require that there be an escrow'd copy he can get  
without my consent.  The second two don't: if NHS investigators  
(hardly doctors involved in my care, which the the claim made in the  
laughable patient records guarantee) wish to see my records, they can  
ask me.  I might even agree.

ian