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SIN believes that one of the major routes to patient empowerment is the immediate access and copies of any documentation/test results relating to health care. One of the biggest advances to this end was the introduction of the Access to Health Records Act 1990. This Act has now been superseded by the Data Protection Act 1998, which came into force on 1st. March 2000, and also replaces the former 1984 Data Protection Act. However, the Access to Health Records Act 1990 still applies for access to records relating to the deceased The Data Protection Act 1998 applies to paper records as well as those held on computer. It is supervised by the Data Protection Commissioner, who is currently Elizabeth France. The Commissioner has the powers to consider individual complaints about the alleged infringement of rights and powers to ensure compliance. There are eight enforceable principles of Data Protection as found at htp://www.dataprotection.gov.uk/principl.htm. They say that the data must be:
Sections 7, 8 and 14 of the Act.are the relevant sections for health records.SIN's Observations: Section Seven : Right of Access to Personal Data There appears
to be no rights for third parties to make applications for access
on behalf of others eg. any individual who is without the mental capacity
to make an application in his or her own right -whether adult or child.Compliance
advice from The Office of the Data Protection Commissioner re: charges
for granting subject access, is rather difficult to understand.
No charge to be made for a visual inspection of manual medical records provided that at least some of these were updated within a period of 40 days prior to the date of the application being made. Section Eight:Provisions Supplementary to Section Seven If any information supplied under Section Seven (1) (c) (i) is supplied in an unintelligble terms, then the data must be accompanied by an explanation of these terms. Section Fourteen: Rectification, Blocking, Erasure & Destruction This section of the Act makes provision for inaccuracies to be rectified or removed Under the DPA a patient is entitled to inspect their medical records. At the moment the maximum charge for copies of records appears to be £50 although it is not clear. The Data Controller must supply the information in 'permanent form'. This normally means a print -out or photocopy, but could also include copies of microfiches, x-rays or audio/video cassettes . The data Controller should normally give access within 40 days. Any unintelligble terms, such as computer codes, must be explained. The patient does not need to say why they want it. The Data Controller cannot refuse access because you might use the data to criticise the controller, complain or take legal action. This seems to be an important step forward in patients' gaining control over their own medical records. The DPA covers all personal data kept in manual or computerised form. Such data covers both facts and opinions held about an individual. The Data Controller has a statutory obligation that whatever data is held on an individual must be accurate. The individual ( patient) can request for correction, providing the data is incorrect or misleading about a matter of fact, or contains an opinion based on data which is factually inaccurate or misleading. In such cases the Controller is obliged by Law to correct, erase, destroy or block the use of such information. Opinions cannot be challenged unless they are based on wrong facts Section Thirteen (1) An individual who suffers damage by reason of any contravention by a data controller of any of the requirements of the Act is entitled to compensation from the data controller for that damage. The
DPA does not appear to allow patients themselves to add a Section 6(b)
type notice. In our experience such Section 6(b) type notices were held
in little regard by doctors or hospitals. Therefore, if the Trust or Heath
Authorities are now obliged by Law to correct inaccurate records, this
would seem to be an improvement. However, if they refuse to comply then
the patient can seek advice from the Data Protection Information Commissioner,
who can force the Trust or HA to correct the records. But the Information
Commissioner has discretionary powers and may not act in favour of the
patient, who would then have to resort to Court action.
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