• Home
• About Us
• Current issue
• Editor's Blog
• Events
• For Advertisers
• News
• Product News
• Product Zone
• Resources
• Subscribe For Free

Patients gain full access to records by 2015

Released 30/11/2011

Government to release health data to stimulate medical research and put decisions into the hands of informed patients

The Department of Health plans to release data about patients to the public in a bid to stimulate medical research and enable patients to take informed decisions about their care.

As outlined in the Chancellor's Growth Review and part of the government's ‘information revolution', new data services will be introduced to help drive improvements in care.

As part of this, patients are to gain full access to their GP records online by the end of this current Parliament in 2015.

While practices with certain software are able to offer patients access to their records, this will be the first time records will become available to all patients across England.

Also for the first time, services provided by the NHS Information Centre for Health and Social Care will link datasets from GP and hospital care, providing health service, pharmaceutical industry, academics and other professionals with information about the journeys of patients through the care system and the outcomes of different treatments.

Alongside this boost to medical research, patients will be able to see new data on GP performance on the NHS Choices website this December, helping them make informed choices about their healthcare.

Further data on GP prescribing will be published which information providers can use to inform patients, supporting them as they make decisions about their own care.

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley commented: "Patients will benefit directly from our efforts to make health data transparent and easy to use by the medical research community.

"This will fuel advances in treatment, as well as positioning this country as a centre of excellence for research.

"We will also encourage information providers to use this data we open up to the public, so they can offer patients insights into the quality of care on offer and drive improvements in the quality of science. 

"Not only will this approach to open data support research and knowledge-based services, it will crucially empower patients to take decisions about their own care and so drive up quality."

See more news stories like this