New GP notes on record will be visible to patients via the NHS App from December onwards, Pulse reports.
New entries made using the GP IT system TPP will be the first to be made public according to NHS Digital. New entries made using Emis will become available in ‘early 2022’, and entries via Vision will follow.
NHS Digital also noted that patients would not see information such as positive test results until results were checked and filed by a GP.
Since April 2020 GPs have given patients online access to the full historic patient record, on request. There are an estimated 18 million users on the NHS app.
NASGP regularly runs advice from Medical Protection Society about practising safely. For example Dr Rachael Birch wrote about writing better notes last September.
Dr Richard Fieldhouse, chair of NASGP, said: “We very much welcome giving patients better access to their clinical notes, with all the opportunities for better management that will go with this.
“But this will place even more pressure on GPs, at a time when we know that general practice has never been under more strain. It’s as if someone is trying to win a competition for the worst time to roll out extra work, when it is quite clear that many GPs are already at breaking point.
“The sensible thing to do would be to delay rollout until the current pressures have waned, and we have more capacity to implement this change in practice with all the care and attention that it deserves.”
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