It is excellent to see that this confirms that plans to turn on automatic sharing of patient records for practices who have requested that this not go ahead, have been halted. This change in approach follows concerns raised by RCGP and others. Many practices are simply not ready to prepare for and implement this change amidst existing workload and workforce pressures, and it would be unsafe for patients to proceed in these circumstances. The RCGP remains supportive of the principle of patients having access to their health records, with appropriate safeguards, and will continue to work with NHS England to ensure access can be expanded safely and in the best interests of patients.
For practices that have already asked their system supplier not to enable automatic record access, or do so at this stage, NHS England have now instructed suppliers to pause. For practices that have not requested a pause, automatic access will be implemented in a phased way with system suppliers contacting practices to agree a switch on date. Read more about the next steps on the NHS Digital website at the link above.
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