Practice Policies and Procedures
Confidentiality & Medical Records
The practice complies with data protection and access to medical records legislation. Identifiable information about you will be shared with others in the following circumstances:
- To provide further medical treatment for you e.g. from district nurses and hospital services.
- To help you get other services e.g. from the social work department. This requires your consent.
- When we have a duty to others e.g. in child protection cases anonymised patient information will also be used at local and national level to help the Health Board and Government plan services e.g. for diabetic care.
If you do not wish anonymous information about you to be used in such a way, please let us know.
Reception and administration staff require access to your medical records in order to do their jobs. These members of staff are bound by the same rules of confidentiality as the medical staff.
Access to Records
In accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998 and Access to Health Records Act, patients may request to see their medical records. Such requests should be made through the practice manager and may be subject to an administration charge.
No information will be released without the patient consent unless we are legally obliged to do so. Find out more here.
Feedback
Hearing from the perspective of patients and their family/carers is important to us. It helps us learn and understand about your care experiences – and helps us to evaluate and improve on the services we provide. We want to hear from you about:
- whether you experienced excellent care and how you found our services
- whether you had an unsatisfactory experience and if so, why?
- if you have any suggestions which you feel would improve our services.
The feedback you give can be anonymous by sharing your story on Care Opinion. Alternatively please complete the Your Experience Matters leaflets which can be found in healthcare premises. We will not ask for any personal information unless you choose to give it to us.
Freedom of Information
Information about the General Practioners and the Practice required for disclosure under this act can be made available to the public.
Complaints
We make every effort to give the best service possible to everyone who attends our practice.
However, we are aware that things can go wrong resulting in a patient feeling that they have a genuine cause for complaint. If this is so, we would wish for the matter to be settled as quickly, and as amicably, as possible.
Complaints are not regarded as negative because each complaint gives us the opportunity to examine what has happened and provides us with the opportunity to change the way we do things.
Our aim is that you receive the best possible care from us and have a positive experience. However, if you have been unhappy with any aspects of your care, you can raise any issues with us.
Violence Policy
The NHS operate a zero tolerance policy with regard to violence and abuse and the practice has the right to remove violent patients from the list with immediate effect in order to safeguard practice staff, patients and other persons.
Violence in this context includes actual or threatened physical violence or verbal abuse which leads to fear for a person’s safety.
In this situation we will notify the patient in writing of their removal from the list and record in the patient’s medical records the fact of the removal and the circumstances leading to it.