Health Information Exchange
Healthcare records are joining up across north central London to improve the services you receive.
To help health and care professionals make quicker and safer decisions about your care, wherever they are treating you, healthcare records are joining up across Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey and Islington (north central London). This is part of the North London Partner’s Health Information Exchange project.
What does this mean for you?
Health and care professionals have shared information on paper for many years – we are now able to do this using digital technology.
When you visit one of our hospitals or your GP, your healthcare worker will have all the information to hand to treat you effectively and efficiently. You won’t need to relay the full story of your symptoms, what happened or the medicines you were prescribed, as this will be already accessible from your notes.
Information will be available in real time – or in some cases within 24 hours – and will ensure your health and care teams have the most up to date information about your care.
Under GDPR regulations, information will only be shared and accessed on a strictly need to know basis by health and care professionals across the five borough of Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey and Islington and only for the purposes of direct care. Data will always be securely held.
What are the benefits of joined-up records?
For people using health and care services, there are many advantages to having joined-up records including:
- Everyone involved in your direct care will have the whole picture
- When you visit somewhere different for care or meet a new care professional, they will have access to your health and care information and you won’t need to repeat your story
- The results of common tests (for example blood tests) will be available to everyone involved in your care, regardless of where the test took place, reducing the need to repeat them or obtain printed results
For us and other health and social care professionals:
- We will have up-to-date information to plan and improve your care and make more informed decisions
- We will have to spend less time finding out relevant information from different health and social care organisations and IT systems, and won’t have to spend time recording duplicate information across records
- We can work as a team across north central London to identify opportunities for improvement, such as seeing if there needs to be more focus on providing physical health checks for people with learning disabilities
More information on the benefits and what is means for you is available on the North London Partner's website here.
Who else is involved?
Other health and care organisations in the North Central London’s sustainability and transformation partnership (NCL STP) such as GP practices and other hospitals/providers across the boroughs of Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey and Enfield.
Do I have a choice?
Due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic and in the public interest all health and care organisations are legally required to share and process data. This is to ensure health and care professionals have access to vital information to make quicker, safer decisions about your care. The national data opt-out does not apply to the disclosure of confidential patient information where there is an overriding public interest in the disclosure. Therefore, the national data opt-out will not apply to data sharing for the purposes of responding to Covid-19. Please read more here: www.northlondonpartners.org.uk/ourplan/Areas-of-work/Digital/Info-residents/opt-out-form.htm
Where can I find out more?
Read more about this on the North London Partners website.
Information also available in a range of languages and formats here.
You can find the Royal Free London's privacy notice here: www.royalfree.nhs.uk/patients-visitors/privacy-notice