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Guidance on secondary uses of patient information

June 2007

Patient health information is collected primarily to provide care for individual patients and it can be used freely for this purpose subject to constraints set out in by the Department of Health. However, secondary uses of patient information are more likely to be subject to a higher standard where disclosure is concerned. No breach of patient confidentiality occurs if the secondary use is carried out by healthcare professionals who already have access to the information in their role of providing care but patients should be made aware that this is taking place.

In this guidance, we focus on disclosure outside the team and consider three broad categories of secondary use:

• Use within the NHS for administration, planning, audit
• Use by agencies commissioned by the NHS to carry out such roles on its behalf
• Use where identifiable information goes beyond health care provision in the NHS to include research and education.

As is discussed in our guidance, it is good practice always to use anonymised data for any secondary purpose where it is practicable to do so and to raise patient awareness about such usage.

Some secondary uses of patient data are for social purposes unconnected with provision of health care, such as disclosure of patient information for insurance or employment purposes. Such disclosure requires explicit patient consent and is covered by other guidance from the BMA.

Download the document as a pdf from the link on the right. (97k)