• Privacy policy

Rotherham Health Record privacy notice

About the Rotherham Health Record

The Rotherham Health Record is an electronic system for sharing your health and care information in a secure way with health and care staff who provide care directly to you. This notice explains how personal and confidential information about you is collected, used and shared within the Rotherham Health Record.

Why the information is needed

It is essential that care professionals delivering direct care to individuals have access to up-to-date and accurate information. When you receive care in a number of places in Rotherham, such as the hospital or your GP Practice, your information is stored on different computer systems. The Rotherham Health Record enables health and care professionals to access, in one place, information held in these different systems in order to deliver better care and decisions to plan and deliver your care effectively. The sharing of this information already occurs in order to deliver care to you; however it is currently done by paper and telephone which can cause delays in your treatment or care.

Who will be controlling your information?

The Rotherham Health Record is a partnership supported by NHS Rotherham Clinical Commissioning Group, The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust, Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust, Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council, Rotherham Hospice and GP Practices within the Rotherham CCG area.

All partners are signatories to the Rotherham Health Record Information Sharing Agreement which provides partner agencies with a robust foundation for the lawful, secure and confidential sharing of personal information.

Each partner has a legal duty to protect your personal information and will remain sole data controller of its own data. We all take confidentiality very seriously and are committed to ensuring all personal information within the Rotherham Health Record is managed in accordance with the relevant legislation to ensure your information is safe, secure and confidential.

Types of information shared within the Rotherham Heath Record

Your Rotherham Health Record will contain key information like:

  • personal details such as name, address, date of birth, next of kin
  • names of the health and care professionals looking after you
  • any medications you are taking
  • any allergies you have
  • dates and reasons for any occasions you have been admitted to hospital
  • appointments
  • test results
  • letters, referrals and discharge information
  • emergency contact details.

It will not contain sensitive information, such as your sexual health history.

Lawful basis for sharing the information

The following outlines the legal basis that will be used to allow us to share your information within the Rotherham Health Record.

  • General Data Protection Regulation
    Article 6 (e): Necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller
    For the purposes of the Rotherham Health Record this is includes the NHS Act 2006, Health and Social Care Act 2012, Health and Social Care Act (Safety and Quality) 2015.
    Article 9 (h): Necessary for the provision of health or social care or the treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services (where processed by or under responsibility of a professional subject to a duty of confidentiality)
  • Common Law Duty of Confidentiality (to satisfy fair and lawful processing under the first principle of GDPR): The sharing of personal confidential data into the Rotherham Health Record and the viewing of information within the Rotherham Health Record are for the purposes of Direct Care only. Accordingly, the patient’s consent to such sharing may be assumed as long the sharing has been communicated to patients, and all patients have the opportunity to opt-out.

How your information will be used and accessed

Personal information contained in the Rotherham Health Record will only ever be used for your direct care and support.

Only health and social care professionals directly involved in your care are allowed to access personal information within the Rotherham Health Record and all access activity is monitored and audited. All partner organisations have ‘Privacy Officers’ these individuals have the ability to audit all access to the Rotherham Health Record ensuring full integrity of the system.

Organisations with whom the information will be shared

The following organisations will have access to, and will share information with, the Rotherham Health Record:

  • The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust
  • Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust
  • Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
  • Rotherham Hospice
  • GP practices within the Rotherham CCG boundary.

Your information will not be shared with anyone who is not providing you with direct care or supporting these services and will never be made available to any third party, unless;

  • where you, the individual to whom the information relates has consented
  • where the disclosure is necessary to safeguard you, the individual, or others, or is in the public interest
  • where there is a legal duty to do so, for example a court order.

How long the information will be kept for

The Rotherham Health Record is a read-only system which allows health and care professionals a view of information contained in other computer systems, it does not hold any clinical patient information within it.

How to object to information being shared within the Rotherham Health Record

You can opt out of having your information shared through the Rotherham Health Record at any time. If you would like to opt out please use one of the following options:

  • Email: rotherhamhealthrecord@nhs.net
  • Ring 01709 427299
  • Write to: Rotherham Health Record Consent
    Subject Access Request Team
    Rotherham Hospital
    Moorgate Road
    Rotherham
    S60 2UD

Your rights

Under the General Data Protection Regulation you have the right to request access to the information held about you as well as who has accessed your information. You also have the right to have information about you corrected in the event that it is inaccurate, not to be subject of automated decision-taking or profiling and to be notified of data breaches. Please contact the care professional providing you with care or treatment in the first instance.