Your medical records

Readers of the national press will be aware that the plan to supply GP-held medical records to various bodies unless you opt-out has been postponed for six months because, it appears, relatively few people were aware of their right to opt-out.

Audlem was, of course, an exception in that AudlemOnline had published the opt-out form from Audlem Medical Practice. Fortunately, the deadline for completing this form if you don't want your records used in this exercise is no longer the end of this month but in the Autumn (if ever!)

Those worried about their privacy will be alarmed that while the records will not include your name, it seems that your post code and date of birth will be included. This precaution should delay insurance companies and others putting two and two together by a matter of seconds!

Putting the other side of the story, used for medical research, the information in these records could be very helpful to epidemiologists and the like helping to combat serious illnesses.

To give you a further opportunity to opt-out, or not – although we suspect that the scheme may change to an opt-in scheme over the coming months after a Parliamentary inquiry goes to work – our original story said:

"GP practices across England will soon be required to supply patients' personal and confidential information to the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC).

"The programme is called care.data and the information uploaded will be used for purposes other than your direct medical care.

"Other medical services will not be able to use this information, but the data is likely to be made available to organisations outside the NHS such as universities and commercial organisations.

"You and your family can opt out of this process, but to do so you have to inform your GP.

Get the leaflet

Click on Audlem Medical Practice leaflet beneath the photo to download the full leaflet including the section to print off, complete and return to the Practice if you want to opt out. The leaflet is also available at the Medical Practice.

More information

You can get more information from a non-commercial website by clicking here.

This article is from our news archive. As a result pictures or videos originally associated with it may have been removed and some of the content may no longer be accurate or relevant.