User talk:Hope123Braveson

Smartcards and passcodes are similar to a chip and PIN credit or debit card, but are more secure, as there is no account information on the Smartcard and the passcode is more complex. A user's Smartcard is printed with their name, photograph and unique user identity number. The photograph is stored centrally, and is always available for an organisation to verify that the Smartcard holder is indeed the person to whom it was issued. All NHS healthcare staff know that it is a disciplinary offence to tamper with Smartcards, share passcodes, or use a Smartcard that doesn't belong to them, and that they may lose their jobs if they do so. Individuals are granted access to patient information based on their work and level of involvement in patient care. This means that, for example, someone working in an administrative role rather than a clinical one might only be able to see the demographic information needed to process an appointment, not the full clinical record.

Increasingly with new applications Registration Authorities will also be able to determine which records an individual might routinely be able to access. Some healthcare staff might on rare occasions need to access data for a patient they don't routinely expect to see – those in A&E for example - and they are specifically enabled to do so.

Most however only need to see data on patients with whom they have a "legitimate relationship" and Registration Authorities will be able to set boundaries around the records of groups of patients for particular users, for the duration of an episode of care.

As more new systems are introduced, every time someone accesses a patient's record, it is being recorded, along with how they used it and this will form an important audit trail which cannot be provided with paper records.

Staff will also continue to be bound by their own professional codes of conduct, local regulations and contractual requirements, the Data Protection Act and the NHS Code of Confidentiality.

There will be occasions when NHS care is provided outside the NHS or is provided jointly, with a local authority for example, and staff, in order to provide that care, will need access to information as would NHS healthcare staff. They have to go through exactly the same steps as NHS healthcare staff to get that access, and are subject to all the same controls, requirements and sanctions as NHS healthcare staff thumbnail