A ‘big brother’ database storing the medical record of almost every patient in Britain has been drastically scaled back amid privacy concerns.
The computerised system was set up to give GPs, hospital doctors and paramedics immediate information about patients, such as allergies or medications.
But critics warned that people’s records were being quietly uploaded on to the database without their knowledge.
Many said it was too difficult to opt out because letters telling them to notify a helpline or visit a website had been discarded without being opened.
There were also fears that the database would include confidential information such as illnesses, and that check-ups could be accessed by non-medical NHS staff including cleaners and porters.
Last night ministers announced that the scheme, known as the Summary Care Record, was being scaled back to include only patients’ most basic information.
This includes their age, address, allergies and current medication. From now on people will also receive an ‘opt out’ form enclosed with the letter informing them of the system.
So far, 30 million people have been sent letters by their GP, and there are another 20 million or so yet to receive them.
More than two million files have already gone on to the database and the remainder will gradually be uploaded over the next few months. But ministers hope that by including the ‘opt out’ form in the initial letter from the GP, patients can easily fill it in and send it back if they do not want their records to go online.
The changes have been brought in following a review by the Department of Health.
Health Minister Simon Burns said: ‘I am pleased that a consensus has emerged about the importance of the Summary Care Record in supporting safe patient care, as long as the core information contained in it is restricted to medication, allergies and adverse reactions.
‘Coupled with improvements to communication with patients which reinforce their right to opt out, we believe this draws a line under the controversies that the SCR has generated up to now.
‘We see this review as having taken a significant step towards the goal of patients owning their records and using them to share decision-making with healthcare professionals.’
A British Medical Association spokesman said it ‘welcomes the progress … yet recognises many of the understandable concerns of patients and clinicians’. He added: ‘Much will depend on the way the amended scheme is put into practice, and the BMA looks forward to continuing our work with government on its implementation.
‘It is essential that patients have genuine control over who has access to their records, and when changes are made.’
Doctors have long been warning that people’s records were being uploaded without their knowledge, as letters had been accidentally thrown away or lost in the post.
Earlier this year the British Medical Association warned that as many as 85 per cent of those who had been sent the letters had never read them.
It also emerged that one in ten medical records could contain wrong information, potentially putting lives at risk.
Many of the files uploaded in a pilot scheme being run in South Birmingham were found to contain out-of-date information.
Currently patient records are in paper files at their GP surgery. But this means that if a patient is taken to hospital unconscious in another part of the country, the doctor there has no way of knowing health problems or which drugs they may be allergic to.
The electronic record system is designed to bypass that problem.
Daily Mail UK