to think that this NHS letter could have waited until after christmas?

[nickelbabe]

DH is a postman.
Today, they all had letters from the NHS to deliver- most houses got at least one (addressed to many different members of the family)

The letter, (DH got one, I didn't) DH has just opened and it's a letter from the NHS saying that they're now doing a thing called patient summary care, which means that all of your allergies/health problems/etc are kept in one summary record so that they can find out information about your health quickly.

It's 3 weeks before Christmas - this circular letter made up about half of their workload today.
On top of this letter, they had their normal mail, plus all the packets and stuff that are being sent for Christmas.

There's no deadline to this letter, there's nothing in the letter to suggest they've sent them out before the winter sets in.

DH is scheduled to finish work at 7 minutes past 2. He actually finished at about 1/4 to 4 today, mainly because of this letter. (he didn't even get out of the office to his delivery until 11o'clock because of how much time it added to the sorting process)

and because the law states that they have to deliver all addressed mail as soon as practicable, it wasn't something that could be left until later.

So, AIBU? Should the NHS have waited until after christmas to send this non-urgent letter?

emsy - but other people on this thread have had their letters months ago - so it obviously is somethign that time frames could have designed around.
post more out in October and november and not out in December?

They were probably supposed to send them off much earlier and are now rushing them off so that at least they can report them as having been sent out in 2011.

It's down to your PCT - ours went out Months ago and all the surgeries in this area are all "live" now with these Summary Care Records.

Also, loads get returned as "undelivered" and the Patients will then be deducted from the GP's books - when often they moved round the corner and forgot to tell anyone!

discrete - that's the best excuse i've heard (and you're probably right)

YABU it's not up to the NHS to plan their projects around your husband's workload. You husband had to work slightly late for one day hardly a big deal. I'd be much more fed up at all the other bits of marketing crap that get sent this time of year.

"they're now doing a thing called patient summary care, which means that all of your allergies/health problems/etc are kept in one summary record so that they can find out information about your health quickly."

Where "they" is anyone in the country who manages to sit in front of an NHS computer with their own or someone else's log-in.

There's already been a case in Scotland of someone illegally accessing records in order to have a nosy.

Some people may not be too bothered, and value the access over their privacy. But for anyone concerned about privacy, about being found by abusive ex-partners, or unenthusiastic about inaccuracies in their medical records being perpetuated instead of corrected, this is a system to opt out of.

Well on the positive side anybody who is getting as worked up about this type of issue as you are, is plainly on the verge of going in to labour. If you burst in to tears on reading this then it's a dead cert for baby tonight!

In balance to Tianc's post I have to say that information governance and data protection is taken very very seriously in the NHS trust where I work. Access to your records is on a need to know basis and it is absolutely not acceptable to ever use someone else's login to access the summary care record.

Abusing the information or looking up information not directly relevant to your job would result in disciplinary action.

YANBU

only because you are over due

YABU to think the NHS will be concerned about the work load of the local posties. Hope your DH gets paid overtime though.

Thanks for the link Tianc - I'll be opting out when my letter arrives.

Yes yes, of course it's not acceptable.

It's not acceptable to wrongly access data from the DVLA database, Police National Computer, telephone companies, hospital records or any of the other databases being discussed right now at the Leveson Inquiry.

The point is once its national it's physically incredibly easy for someone to look stuff up whether it's acceptable or not. Who may or may not get any meaningful sanction, but a bit bloody late if it's your violent, hospital-worker exP.

Btw, iirc, this is the data Dave was planning to flog to private companies just this week.

More detailed info from a GP not keen on it all [[http://www.nhsdatabase.info/ here.]

Some people may feel that they'd like to be on the database anyway. It's a personal decision. Informed consent, and all that.

Uff, link here.

Actually it isn't this data Dave is trying to flog. The data currently held in the Summary Care record is only demographics. The data Dave is flogging is anonymised clinical data which will not be patient identifiable. The private companies will be given data extracts with patient identifiable data removed they will not be granted access to the summary care record or electronic patient record when it goes on line in a few years.

As you say people should make an informed choice and they may not be happy with either type of data being shared but it's best to be armed with the correct information.

Yes, I agree it's not the full SCR that's being flogged.

What I can't remember (maybe you can), is whether the these data extracts are coming from the SCRs. Taking medical records, removing name and full address, and aggregating info before selling goes a considerable way towards anonymising, but may not be fully effective.

"Patient Concern said it had real worries about the proposal to make patients' medical data available to private firms as the information would include postcodes and age profiles which would be possible to trace back to the individuals concerned." BBC, 5 December 2011.

(Sorry, not sure what you mean by SCR holding only demographics: each SCR is an individual medical record, no?)

I guess it'll all come under Secondary Use Services.

I do remember that flogging the Spine data to pharmaceutical companies has been foreseen for quite a while.

And I could be quite happy about that. It does depend entirely how it's done, from the POV of individual privacy and also the POV of intellectual property rights.

Do you think your husband could deliver my post please? I have had no post for 2 days which is very odd at this time of year and as my mother (not far away) has had several cards from my old schoolfriends which I normally get too and I am waiting very impatiently for some internet orders which are overdue.

I think our posties are sat by the fire with a cup of tea because it's too cold and windy out!

Oh yes I don't want postmen breaking their legs in the snow but our postman only set out if it was practically tropical last year between november and march and we live in scotland so you can imagine how frequently we got post. This is why I have little sympathy tbh. Our new postman is quite sweet but doesn't deliver until 3pm usually. there is a very very very sexy postman who occasionally does this round and I have a lot of sympathy for him obviously

At least it was a proper letter, I get fed up of all the junk mail dumped thru my door. I put the last lot back in the post box!

I dont think my credit card bills are vital post at this time of the year. I wonder if we could stop all of them being sent out as the work load is to much at christmas?

WRT the sorting, did the NHS not have to order the letters in an up-one-side-of-the-street-down-the-other style?
I thought you had to do that for a bulk mailing....

it doesn't matter if they did (I don't know if they did)
Frames are set out how the postman delivers the mail - it's not always up-one-side-the-done-the-other.
but even if that's how the frame is laid out, they still have to put each letter into its hoel, because they go out in addition to the normal post that day, so it's not as easy (unfortunately) as just putting them into your bag and going off.

Bollocks NothernLurker - I laughed out loud, and then read the comment about crying :( :( :( :( :(

We got those letters ages ago. I'd say they've done a reasonable job of phasing it in.

timidviper - i'm afraid if your orders are packets, there's a chance they're being held onto.
It appears (which the posties in our Delivery Office are fuming about!) that packets aren't so important as letters - and when your regular has a day off, the cover is not obliged to deliver your packets.
(one of the ladies in our DO was practically forced to work on her day off last week because she was told her packets wouldn't go out - she works 3 days a week, and had only just come back to a massive load of packets that had had to be left in favour of the letters, and knew that if she took her next day off, that it would be twice as bad when she got back, using the evidence that she had piles of packets to take out when she got back that time)
So, it's more than likely that your packets are sitting waiting for your postie to come back from his day off.

But if they wait until after Christmas, won't they just be clogging up the DELUGE of thank-you notes and...if they wait further still, the Valentine's mail?

Bigger problems in the world, frankly...