Shared care records are a local solution based on geography for sharing important and up-to-date information about patients’ health and care.
For practitioners, sharing data is essential to enable them to provide the best possible care to patients and service users but it also helps more efficient working across health and social care in Sussex.
Data sharing will always take place in a safe environment to ensure that people who access the data have a legitimate reason to do this.
Sharing patients’ records gives a more complete picture of a patient’s journey across different services and is about achieving a better experience and better care for the patient. This includes current health issues, medications, recent test results, care plan or treatment plan details, and information on social care or support needs. The information can be from primary care, community services, mental health services, social care, secondary care, and specialist services such as ambulance services and cancer services and can also contain documents such as outpatient department (OPD) letters and discharge summaries.
Shared records are designed to ensure that an individual does not need to tell their story again and again to different health and care practitioners.
This can improve safety and efficiency, but also supports patients in what is often a difficult time.
Shared care records (ShCR) are not to be confused with the summary care record (SCR). Summary care records enable some patient information, taken from the GP record, including as a minimum name, address, date of birth, NHS number, current medication, allergies and sensitivities, to be shared nationally between clinicians in NHS organisations to support the direct care of patients.