Care.data fears given short shrift

NHS England’s chief data officer has pooh-poohed concerns over the privacy and security of the organisation’s care.data programme, dismissing them as “scare stories” whipped up by the media.
Speaking at a techUK event, Geraint Lewis insisted most of the coverage was not based on truth, and added: “There were lots of scare stories being run that the data would be used for insurance purposes.”
Lewis said the main aim of the programme was to improve the richness of the data that the NHS holds and plug any gaps in the information covering what happens to patients before and after hospital visits.
Hospital data has been recorded in the national Hospital Episode Statistics database since the Eighties, but the new scheme – which is currently being trialled in just over 100 surgeries – is designed to bring this up to date.
Lewis added: “By definition, [the current system] only captures hospital episode statistics, and we all know that the context in which the patient is living is crucially important: what led up to that hospital admission and what occurred afterwards,”
However, Lewis did concede that the NHS is effectively ignoring the wishes of about 700,000 people who have already opted out of the Care.data programme. Last month MPs were told the organisation is “unable to implement or respect those objections”.
The Health & Social Care Information Centre has appointed clinical expert Professor Martin Severs to try to resolve the issue, he said.
Last month it was revealed how the current trials are shunning marketing, instead getting GP practices to contact patients individually to warn them their personal medical data will be shared unless they opt out.
The move follows one of the most spectacular marketing cock-ups in recent years when the NHS launched a nationwide door-drop campaign only for it to be buried under piles of other leaflets.

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