B5 U18 - Handling Personal information

B5 U18 - Handling Personal information

1. Experiences of records

   • HV Christine Fuller - Brian & Amy
     • Role of records
       • Contractual requirement
       • Keep all medical bodies in the loop (interdisciplinary)
     • Partiality of records
       • Normal delivery - felt traumatic to Amy
       • Feeling like Christine is more interested in form than person
     • Mistakes in records
       • Making records in real-life situations can be very challenging and requires good professional judgement about what really matters
   • Dan Morgan and his mother
     • Getting a hold of your own records
       • Data Protection Act (1998) - access can be denied or limited if it is seen to cause physical or mental harm
   • Making your own records
     • People can be asked to keep informal records to help manage their medication. Diabetics, depression, anxiety.

2. Why we need records

   • SU histories are not forgotten and can be used to make informed care decisions
   • So that Care Workers can remember what has been done and what will happen in the future
   • SU knows what has happened and what services they can recieve
   • Care can be provided by more than one worker
   • Care can be co-ordinated between agencies
   • Signed records prove that something has happened
   • To provide information which improves public health

3. Sharing information from personal records

   • Confidential - information unavailable in public domain, shared in a relationship where the person understands it can't be shared
   • Sensitive information is about race, political, religious, sex life, offences
     • This kind of information can be shared and isn't always confidential. It is at the discretion of the person involved
   • Consent
     • Explicit - The person gives consent knowing exactly what they are agreeing to.
     • Implied - is when someone has not explicitly said that their personal information may be shared but their behaviour suggests that they are aware that it will be passed on and they are happy with this
   • Carers often feel that that they need to know details of the SU in order to support them better. NHS guidelines say that without explicit consent from the SU
   • Brian & Amy - confides in HV Christine
     • Confidentiality should be breached if more harm will be done by maintaining it than breaching it.

4. Electronic records

   • +ive
     • Better access
     • Legibility
     • Collating information
     • Physical storage
   • -ive
     • Dependence on internet access
     • Information overload
     • Costs large centralised IT system
     • Reliability
     • Security and confidentiality