All patients’ records on file or computer are completely confidential. The practice complies with the Access to Medical Records Act, the Data Protection Act and the Freedom of Information Act. Access to patient records is limited to health professionals and administration staff who are bound by a code of confidentiality. In order to maintain confidentiality, test results will only be given to the patients themselves or parents of minors.

How we collect, look after and use your data. This notice explains how Vesper Road and Morris Lane Surgery will collect, look after, use or otherwise process your personal data. “Personal data” is information relating to you as a living, identifiable individual.

HOW IS MY INFORMATION COLLECTED AND LOOKED AFTER?

The name and contact details of our organisation.

Name: Amy Kerfoot

Address: Vesper Road & Morris Lane Surgery, 43 Vesper Road, Leeds, LS5 3QT

The contact details of our data protection officer

Our Data Protection Officer is Louise Whitworth and they can be contacted on: [email protected]

What we do

As a GP practice we are responsible for your day to day medical care and the purpose of this notice is to inform you of the type of information that we hold about you, how that information is used for your care, our legal basis for using the information, who we share this information with and how we keep it secure and confidential.

It covers information we collect directly from you (that you have either provided to us, or from consultations with staff members), or we collect from other organisations who manage your care (such as hospitals or community services).

We are required by law to maintain records about your health and treatment, or the care you have received within any NHS service.

Our Commitment to Data Privacy and Confidentiality

As a Practice, we are committed to protecting your privacy and will only process data in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018, the Common Law Duty of Confidentiality, professional codes of practice, the Human Rights Act 1998 and other appropriate legislation.

Everyone working for the Practice has a legal and contractual duty to keep information about you confidential. All our staff receive appropriate and ongoing training to ensure that they are aware of their personal responsibilities and their obligations to uphold confidentiality.

Staff are trained to ensure how to recognise and report any incident and the organisation has procedures for investigating, managing and learning lessons from any incidents that occur.

All identifiable information that we hold about you in an electronic format will be held securely and confidentially in secure hosted servers that pass stringent security standards.

Any companies or organisations we use we may use to process your data are also legally and contractually bound to operate under the same security and confidentiality requirements.

All identifiable information we hold about you within paper records is kept securely and confidentially in lockable cabinets with access restricted to appropriately authorised staff.

As an organisation we are required to provide annual evidence of our compliance with all applicable laws, regulations and standards through the Data Security and Protection toolkit.

Your information will not be sent outside of the United Kingdom where the laws do not protect your privacy to the same extent as the law in the UK. We will never sell any information about you.

In addition to our Data Protection Officer, we also have a senior person within the practice who is responsible for protecting the confidentiality of our records and ensuring that any use of your data is fair and appropriate- this person is the Caldicott Guardian. The Caldicott Guardian for the practice is:

The practice is registered with the Information Commissioners Office as a Data Controller- our registration number is: Z7193009 and you can view our registration here https://ico.org.uk/ESDWebPages/Search

We will endeavour to maintain our duty of confidentiality to you at all times and will only share data about you if we genuinely believe that it would improve the care you provide for you.

Other than for the purposes of direct care or indirect care (such as healthcare planning), we will only share your information without your permission when we are required to do so under exceptional circumstances (such as a serious risk to yourself and others) or if it is required by law.

The categories of personal data we hold and the sources we obtain them from

• Details about you, such as your name, address, carers, biological gender, gender identity, ethnic origin, date of birth, legal representatives and emergency contact details are collected from you when you register with the practice via the GMS1 form and new patient questionnaire you fill in when your register.
• Information that you provide about your health when you consult with healthcare professionals at the practice, which will be recorded in your notes
• Any contact the surgery has with you, such as appointments, clinic visits, emergency appointments, etc. are recorded on our clinical system
• Notes and reports about your health- your historic notes are transferred to us from your old practice- this can happen electronically and your paper notes are transferred via an organisation called Primary Care Support England
• Results of investigations such as laboratory tests, x-rays, etc. which are sent to the practice electronically from hospitals
• Any consultations you may have had with “extended access” hubs, which the practice is part of.
• We are routinely informed of any A&E visits or outpatient appointments at local hospitals
• We are routinely advised of any contact with out of hours providers or NHS111
• We are hold details of any other relevant information from other health professionals, relatives or those who care for you. All information flows within the practice are routinely mapped as part of our GDPR compliance and compliance with the Data Security and Protection toolkit.

How we use your personal data (the purposes of processing).

As health professionals, we maintain records about you in order to support your care. By registering with the practice, your existing records will be transferred to us from your previous practice so that we can keep them up to date while you are our patient and if you do not have a previous medical record (a new-born child or coming from overseas, for example), we will create a medical record for you.

We take great care to ensure that your information is kept securely, that it is up to date, accurate and used appropriately. All of our staff are trained to understand their legal and professional obligations to protect your information and will only look at your information if they need to.

We use a processor, iGPR Technologies Limited (“iGPR”), to assist us with responding to report requests relating to your patient data, such as subject access requests that you submit to us (or that someone acting on your behalf submits to us) and report requests that insurers submit to us under the Access to Medical Records Act 1988 in relation to a life insurance policy that you hold or that you are applying for. iGPR manages the reporting process for us by reviewing and responding to requests in accordance with our instructions and all applicable laws, including UK data protection laws. The instructions we issue to iGPR include general instructions on responding to requests and specific instructions on issues that will require further consultation with the GP responsible for your care.

For provision of direct care:

In the practice, individual staff will only look at what they need in order to carry out such tasks as booking appointments, making referrals, giving health advice or provide you with care.

Primary Care Networks:

All practices in the UK are members of a Primary Care Network (PCN), which is a group of practices who have chosen to work together and with local community, mental health, social care, pharmacy, hospital and voluntary services to provide care to their patients.

PCNs are built on the core of current primary care services and enable greater provision of proactive, personalised, coordinated and more integrated health and social care.

We are members of Woodsley & Holt PCN along with Burton Croft, Ireland Wood Surgery, Kirkstall Health Centre, Abbey Grange & Craven Road surgery of other practices in Woodsley & Holt  PCN.

This arrangement means that practices within the same PCN may share data with other practices within the PCN, for the purpose of patient care (such as extended hours appointments and other services), Each practice within the PCN is part of a stringent data sharing agreement that means that all patient data shared is treated with the same obligations of confidentiality and data security.

For commissioning and healthcare planning purposes:

In some cases, for example when looking at population healthcare needs, some of your data may be shared (usually in such a way that you cannot be identified from it). The following organisations may use data in this way to inform policy or make decisions about general provision of healthcare, either locally or nationally.

• Leeds City Council: Public Health, Adult or Child Social Care Services
• Leeds Clinical Commissioning Group (or their approved data processors)
• NHS Digital (Formerly known as (HSCIC)
• The “Clinical Practice Research Datalink” (EMISWeb practices) or ResearchOne Database(SystmOne practices).
• Other data processors which you will be informed of as appropriate.

In order to comply with its legal obligations, we may send data to NHS Digital when directed by the Secretary of State for Health under the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

This practice contributes to national clinical audits and will send the data which are required by NHS Digital when the law allows. This may include demographic data, such as date of birth, and information about your health which is recorded in coded form, for example, the clinical code for diabetes or high blood pressure.

For research purposes:

Research data is usually shared in a way that individual patients are non-identifiable.  Occasionally where research requires identifiable information you may be asked for your explicit consent to participate in specific research projects.  The surgery will always gain your consent before releasing any information for this purpose unless the research has been granted a specific exemption from the Confidentiality Advisory Group of the Health Research Authority

Where specific information is asked for, such as under the National Diabetes audit, you will be given the choice to opt of the audit.

For safeguarding purposes, life or death situations or other circumstances when we are required to share information:

We may also disclose your information to others in exceptional circumstances (i.e. life or death situations) or in accordance with Dame Fiona Caldicott’s information sharing review (Information to share or not to share).

For example, your information may be shared in the following circumstances:

• When we have a duty to others e.g. in child protection cases
• Where we are required by law to share certain information such as the birth of a new baby, infectious diseases that may put you or others at risk or where a Court has decided we must.

When you request to see your information or ask us to share it with someone else:

If you ask us to share your data, often with an insurance company, solicitor, employer or similar third party, we will only do so with your explicit conse. Usually the requesting organisation will ask you to confirm your consent, often in writing or electronically. We check that consent before releasing any data and you can choose to see the information before we send it.

The lawful basis for the processing.

We are required to tell you the legal basis that is used for the various ways we process and use your data. In order to process your personal data we must specify a lawful basis and if we process any personal  data that is deemed to be “special category” data we must also specify a separate condition for processing special category data.

The following table sets the main ways your personal data may be used and the corresponding legal basis and category of data. Each purpose is covered in more detail within this notice to explain what these mean in more practical terms.

The recipients and categories of recipients of personal data.

We share information about you with other health professionals where they have a genuine need for it to support your care, as follows.

From time to time we may offer you referrals to other providers, specific to your own health needs- in these cases we will discuss the referral with you and advise you that we will be sharing your information (generally by referral) with those organisations.

The details of transfers of the personal data to any third countries or international organisations.

As a GP surgery, the only occasions when this would occur would be if you specifically requested this to occur- the practice will never routinely send patient data outside of the UK where the laws do not protect your privacy to the same extent as the law in the UK.

Retention periods for your personal data.

As long as you are registered as a patient with the surgery, your paper records are held at the practice along with your GP electronic record. If you register with a new practice, they will initiate the process to transfer your records. The electronic record is transferred to the new practice across a secure NHS data-sharing network and all practices aim to process such transfers within a maximum of 8 working days. The paper records are then transferred which can take longer. Primary Care Services England also look after the records of any patient not currently registered with a practice and the records of anyone who has died.

Once your records have been forwarded to your new practice (or after your death forwarded to Primary Care Services England), a cached version of your electronic record is retained in the practice and classified as “inactive”. If anyone has a reason to access an inactive record, they are required to formally record that reason and this action is audited regularly to ensure that all access to inactive records is valid and appropriate.  We may access this for clinical audit (measuring performance), serious incident reviews, or statutory report completion (e.g., for HM Coroner).

A summary of retention periods for medical records can be found on the BMA website

The rights available to you in respect of data processing.

Under the GDPR all patients have certain rights in relation to the information which the practice holds about them. Not all of these will rights apply equally, as certain rights are not available depending on situation and the lawful basis used for the processing- for reference these rights may not apply are where the lawful basis we use (as shown in the above table in the section on “lawful bases”) is:

• Processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller – in these cases the rights of erasure and portability will not apply.
• Legal Obligation – in these cases the rights of erasure, portability, objection, automated decision making and profiling will not apply.

Right to be informed

You have the right to be informed of how your data is being used. The propose of this document is to advise you of this right and how your data is being used by the practice

The right of access

You have the right of access You have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information- this right always applies. There are some exemptions, which means you may not always receive all the information we process.

The right to rectification

You have the right to ask us to rectify information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete. This right always applies.

The right to erasure

You have the right to ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances- This will not generally apply in the matter of health care data

The right to restrict processing

You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your information in certain circumstances– You have to right to limit the way in which your data is processed if you are not happy with the way the data has been managed.

The right to object

You have the right to object to processing if you disagree with the way in which part of your data is processed you can object to this- please bear in mind that this may affect the medical services we are able to offer you

Rights in relation to automated decision making and profiling.

Your rights in relation to automated processing– Sometimes your information may be used to run automated calculations. These can be as simple as calculating your Body Mass Index or ideal weight but they can be more complex and used to calculate your probability of developing certain clinical conditions, and we will discuss these with you if they are a matter of concern.

Typically, the ones used in the practice may include:

Qrisk– a cardiovascular risk assessment tool which uses data from your record such as your age, blood pressure, cholesterol levels etc to calculate the probability of you experiencing a cardiovascular event over the next ten years.

Qdiabetes– a diabetes risk assessment  tool  which uses your age, blood pressure, ethnicity data etc to calculate the probability of you developing diabetes.

CHADS – an assessment tool which calculates the risk of a stroke occurring for patients with atrial Fibrillation

This is not an exhaustive list- other tools may be used depending on your personal circumstances and health needs, however whenever we use these profiling tools, we assess the outcome on a case-by-case basis. No decisions about individual care are made solely on the outcomes of these tools, they are only used to help us us assess your possible future health and care needs with you and we will discuss these with you.

The right to data portability

Your right to data portability This only applies to information you have given us- you have the right to ask that we transfer the information you gave us from one organisation to another, or give it to you. The right only applies if we are processing information based on your consent or under a contract, and the processing is automated, so will only apply in very limited circumstances

The right to withdraw consent

Because under the provisions of Data Protection Law most of the data processing activities carried out by the practice are not done under the “lawful basis” of consent you cannot withdraw consent as such, however if you are not happy with the way your data is being processed you do have the right to object and the right to ask us to restrict processing.

There is a new national opt-out that allows people to opt out of their confidential patient information being used for certain reasons other than their individual care and treatment. The system offers patients and the public the opportunity to make an informed choice about whether they wish their personally identifiable data to be used just for their individual care and treatment or also used for research and planning purposes. Details of the national patient opt out can be found online.

In the past, you may have already chosen to prevent your identifiable data leaving NHS Digital, known as a Type 2 opt-out. All existing Type 2 opt-outs will be converted to the new national data opt-out and this will be confirmed by a letter to all individuals aged 13 or over with an existing Type 2 objection in place. Once the national data opt-out is launched, it will no longer be possible to change preferences via local GP practices.

The right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority.

If you are happy for your information to be used, and where necessary shared, for the purposes described in this notice then you do not need to do anything.

Should you have any concerns about how your information is managed at the practice, please contact us.

If you are still unhappy following a review by the GP practice, you can then complain to the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) via:

• Their website: ico.org.uk
• Email: [email protected]
• Telephone: 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745
• Or by mail: The Information Commissioner

Wycliffe House

Water lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

All GP practices are required to declare the mean earnings (e.g. average pay) for GPs working to deliver NHS services to patients at each practice.

All GP practices are required to declare the mean earnings (e.g. average pay) for GPs working to deliver NHS services to patients at each practice.

However, it should be noted that the prescribed method for calculating earnings is potentially misleading because it takes no account of how much time doctors spend working in the practice, paying staff and should not be used to form any judgement about GP earnings, nor to make any comparison with any other practice.

 The average pay for GPs working in Vesper Road & Morris Lane Surgeries in the last financial year was £131,677 before tax and National Insurance. This is for 2 full time GPs and 2 part time GPs who worked in the practice for more than six months.”

Every patient at the practice is allocated a named, accountable GP. This ensures you have a ‘usual’ GP as a point of contact and to assist with continuity of care. You should always try and see your usual GP, especially for ongoing problems, however we understand this is not always possible which is why there are no restrictions on seeing other doctors.

It is possible to change your named GP at any time, please contact reception who will be happy to help.

Vesper Road & Morris Lane Surgery are actively contributing to medical research which we believe plays an important role in improving the medicine we practice.

Overview

As well being committed to improving the care our own patients receive, we also believe in helping the progress of medicine in general. We have joined the National Institute for Health Research as a ‘research ready practice’ and have been approved by the Royal College of General Practitioners.

By being part of this network we hope to help develop medical research within primary care. This can mean supporting research studies and clinical trials, collecting data and working in partnership with other practices and NHS organisations.

We have participated in several studies already such as the management of pain from cancer, hand osteoarthritis and helicobacter eradication.

What does this mean for patients?

It simply means that occasionally we could ask you if you would be interested in participating in some research, in the same way you might be asked if you go to a local hospital. However, you do not have to take part if you do not want to.

We welcome feedback about your experiences, as it lets the practice know what we are doing well and where we could improve.

Talk to us.

The Practice is committed to providing high-quality, person-centred care and treatment that’s both safe and effective. However, we understand that there are times when things go wrong. If something goes wrong, or you’re dissatisfied with what we have or haven’t done, please tell us, and we’ll do our best to make things right. If we can’t resolve matters the way you want, we’ll explain why it’s not possible to do as you suggest.

Understandably, you might be upset or distressed when formally raising concerns about you or your loved one’s care. Our practice team will treat you with respect and dignity throughout this emotional time. It’s expected that you will show them the same courtesy.

We hope that if you have a problem, you will use our practice complaints procedure. We believe this will give us the best chance of resolving whatever has gone wrong and allowing us to improve our services.

Who to talk to

If you have any concerns, you can talk to any member of our staff initially. We will work with you to resolve the issue without any formal process. It’s usually best to sort out concerns within the practice. However, if you need to make a formal complaint, you can do so through our Practice Manager via email on the practice email [email protected]

If you find it challenging to raise your concerns with us because, for example, there has been a breakdown in the patient-practice relationship, you can raise your complaint with the ICB, who commission and pay for the NHS services you use by:

Email: at [email protected]

Telephone: 01924 552150*

*Monday to Friday, 9- 4.30 pm, excluding bank holidays.

Please note that the team receives many telephone calls daily and may be unable to respond instantly.

In writing: West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board Complaints Team, White Rose House West Parade, Wakefield WF1 1LT 

Please note: You cannot ask the ICB to consider the same concerns or complaints you raised with us.

Citizens Advice Bureau also provides information and advice about making complaints.

Take it Further.

If you remain unhappy after receiving our final reply, you can ask the Health Service Ombudsman to review your complaint independently.

Before taking this step, we hope you would let us know what aspect of the complaint has not been dealt with satisfactorily and provide an opportunity for us to consider whether there is anything further that could be done locally to resolve matters.

The Ombudsman is independent of the NHS and free to use. It can help resolve your complaint and tell the NHS how to put things right if it has got them wrong.

The Ombudsman only has legal powers to investigate certain complaints. You must have received a final response from the Practice before the Ombudsman can look at your complaint. Unless there are exceptional circumstances, it will generally not investigate your complaint if it happened more than 12 months ago.

Address: Parliamentary & Health Service Ombudsman

Tower 30

Millbank

London SW1P 4QP

Phone: 0345 015 4033

Their lines are open: Monday to Thursday, 8.30 am to 5.00 pm | Friday, 8.30 am to 12 pm.