General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR)2018
St Lukes Surgery - Practice Privacy Notice to patients
Practice Privacy Notice explains why we as a practice collect information about our patients and How we use your information
Practice Privacy Notice Covid-19
Sharing your GP medical record with other healthcare professionals involved in your healthcare Sharing GP Record
Primary Care Clusters; Access to your Medical Information GP Clusters-sharing medical information
The Freedom of Information (FOI) Act was passed on 30 November 2000. It gives a general right of access to all types of recorded information held by public authorities, with full access granted in January 2005. The Act sets out exemptions to that right and places certain obligations on public authorities.
FOI replaced the Open Government Code of Practice, which has been in operation since 1994. For further details on Freedom of Information see Freedom of information-ICO
Data Protection and FOI - how do the two interact?
The Data Protection Act 1998 came into force on 1 March 2000. It provides living individuals with a right of access to personal information held about them. The right applies to all information held in computerised form and also to non-computersised information held in filing systems structured so that specific information about particular individuals can be retrieved readily.
Individuals already have the right to access information about themselves (personal data), which is held on computer and in some paper files under the Data Protection Act 1998/GDPR2018.
The right also applies to those archives that meet these criteria. However, the right is subject to exemptions, which will affect whether information is provided. Requests will be dealt with on a case by case basis.
The Data Protection Act does not give third parties rights of access to personal information for research purposes.
The FOI Act does not give individuals access to their personal information, though if a request is made, the Data Protection Act gives the individual this right. If the individual chooses to make this information public it could be used alongside non-personal information gained by the public under the terms of the FOI Act.
Further information on the processing of personnal identifiable information can be obtained from the Information Commissioners Office (ICO)