Patients can't stop their data being put onto NHS “spine,” department says
BMJ 2006; 333 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.39056.373935.DB (Published 07 December 2006) Cite this as: BMJ 2006;333:1188- Owen Dyer
- 1London
The government's chief medical officer for England, Liam Donaldson, has written to GPs urging them to pass on to the Department of Health letters from patients who do not want their medical records uploaded to a national computerised database.
The government's plan to centralise the medical records of 50 million patients in England in a national database known as the national care record, or simply as the “spine,” is meeting increasing opposition.
A poll conducted by ICM Research two weeks ago found that 53% of NHS patients who responded opposed the plan. A Medix poll of GPs found that 52% would refuse to upload data without a patient's specific consent.
The Department of Health now says that patients do not …
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