Registration has started for ‘advanced accounts’ offering patients the opportunity to view their Summary Care Records on HealthSpace, the NHS online personal health register.
The service has opened up in tandem with the launch of the first Summary Care Records (SCRs). Nearly 50,000 of the summaries drawn from GP records in participating practices in Bolton have been uploaded on the NHS Spine for use by out-of-hours staff.
More practices in Bury, Dorset and South Birmingham are also preparing to be early adopter sites for the SCR. Patients in Bury are the first to be offered their own route into their personal SCR.
“HealthSpace is the window into the Summary Care Record for patients,” said Dr Gillian Braunold, Connecting for Health’s (CfH) clinical director for the SCR and HealthSpace.
Patients wishing to view their SCR will face stricter security checks than those using HealthSpace simply to keep personal record of their healthcare and wellbeing, Dr Braunold explained.
Like NHS staff registering for a smartcard, patients will have to present two forms of ID confirming their residency and their address, which must be the same as the address held by their GP.
In addition ‘advanced’ HealthSpace users will be issued with a smartcard card made by security specialists, Entrust, with a grid of numbers on one side. After entering a username and password, patients will have to key in correct responses, derived from the card’s grid, to three challenges from the HealthSpace system.
Dr Braunold agreed that the system was quite complex and patients’ experiences of using it would be carefully monitored.
Connecting for Health’s national patient lead, Marlene Winfield, said work was going on to look at the barriers to use. “We’re looking at what kind of information and support people will need to remove these barriers,” she said.
Nevertheless, Dr Braunold said the CfH team was just beginning to realise the potential of advanced HealthSpace use. “One of the most exciting opportunities patients have is in terms of control of their SCR,” she said.
For example, patients will be able to give doctors access to their record if they are travelling abroad or even to another part of England where the SCR was not available.
The facility would be particularly useful for people managing conditions requiring complex drug regimes, she said.
Registrations number ‘a few hundred’ so far and Dr Braunold said the current estimate is that between 5-10% of patients will want the service.
For the future, she envisages that HealthSpace will do much more than provide a view of the SCR. Shared care plans, organ donor status, advance directives for terminal care and feedback on experiences of using health services are all possible developments.
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