Unsent updates to the Summary Care Record

To clarify, the scale of the issue with unsent updates is significantly smaller than has been reported. Following detailed investigations, we can confirm that the majority of these 'unsent' messages were not meant to be sent to the SCR.

There remains a requirement for users to utilise safety features such as Smartcards. It is important that these are used as intended to prevent unauthorised users accessing and updating records.

Summary Care Record Opt out process and ICO advice

In relation to the role of GPs in the opt-out process for patients, NHS Connecting for Health sought guidance from the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) in May 2010 about GPs considering opting out all their patients from the SCR.

The ICO has advised that GPs should take reasonable steps to ensure that the majority of their patients are informed about their intentions to opt them out.

This is because patients may have assumed an SCR has been created, given the letter they received suggested it would be, unless they took steps to opt out.

The ICO also advised that the issue of GPs opting out patients en masse may raise data protection issues.