Obtaining Information from your Medical Record

The Data Protection Act 2018 gives every living person (or authorised representative) the right to apply for access to their health records.

Online Access to Medical Records

As of April 2020, full information from Medical Records can be accessed as part of the Practice’s online services. For security reasons, you will have to contact the practice to confirm your identity before you are granted access to these records.

To make a subject access request

A request for your medical health records held at York Street Medical Practice should be completed using our online form. Please click HERE

When making your request for access, it would be helpful if you could provide details of the time-periods and aspects of your health record you require (this is optional, but it may help us to reduce the time taken to deal with  your access request).

If not all the information you require is available online, you will receive paper copies of additional information.

Costs

Under the Data Protection Act 2018 There is no charge to view your health records or to be provided with a copy of them. 

However, the practice is alloiwed to charge a fee if requests are unfounded, excessive or repetitive.

Once the data controller has all the required information,  your request should be fulfilled within 28 days (in exceptional circumstances where it is not possible to comply within this period you will be informed of the delay and given a timescale for when your request is likely to be met).

Exemptions

In some circumstances, the Act permits the data controller to withhold information held in your health record. These rare cases are:

• Where it has been judged that supplying you with the information is likely to cause serious harm to the physical or mental health or condition of you, or any other person, or;
• Where providing you with access would disclose information relating to or provided by a third person who had not consented to the disclosure. This exemption does not apply where that third person is a clinician involved in your care.

If you are using an authorised representative, you need to be aware that in doing so, they may gain access to all health records concerning you, which
may not all be relevant. If this is a concern, you should inform your representative of what information you wish them to specifically request when they are applying for access.

GPs have ethical obligations around how patient records are shared, and will explain to patients,
in broad terms, the implications of making a Subject Access Request so they can make an informed decision on whether they wish to exercise their rights under the Data Protection Act.

If you have any complaints about any aspect of your application to obtain access to your health records, you should first discuss this with the Practice Manager.

Further information about the NHS Complaints Procedure is available on the NHS Choices website.

Alternatively you can contact the Information Commissioners Office (responsible for governing Data Protection compliance) –

Wycliffe House,

Water Lane,

Wilmslow,

Cheshire,

SK9 5AF

Tel 01625 545745 or www.ico.org.uk/

All complaints will be acknowledged within three working days and a full response will be provided within 10 working days. If a complaint is made verbally to the practice, this will be documented and you will be asked to confirm in writing that you agree with what has been recorded.