Health Records - To help others

Your information may be used to help protect and improve the health of other people, and to help create new services in the future.

Under the law, your doctor may have to give information to certain organisations.

• Under the 1984 Public Health (Control of Disease) Act and the 1988 Public Health (Infectious Diseases) Regulations, doctors have to pass on information that is needed to prevent the outbreak of certain diseases. If you have an infectious disease which might endanger the safety of others (eg meningitis or measles but not HIV/AIDS) then your doctors will tell the relevant organisations.
• The 2001 Health and Social Care Act (Section 60) allows certain organisations to ask for essential information from your GP or hospital in order to carry out their work. This is strictly controlled and is only allowed after an application has been made to and approved by the Secretary of State for Health.

Some services need information to support medical research and follow trends in diseases. This makes sure that:

• Healthcare organisations can plan ahead and provide the right services to the right people
• Progress can be made in diagnosing and managing diseases
• Drugs can be made more effective for example, by reducing side effects

As a teaching Health Board, it is necessary to share information with those staff in training. All staff in training have the same duty of confidentiality as all other Health Board Staff.