Appointing a Practice Privacy Officer

In line with the usual governance associated with the accessing of patient records, the Caldicott Guardian within each organisation has a responsibility for protecting confidentiality when it comes to SCR viewing. GP practices undertaking SCR viewing must ensure that at least one Privacy Officer (PO) has been nominated for their organisation. The Caldicott Guardian may choose to devolve this responsibility to another individual in the Practice. The Privacy Officer will need to manage any alerts that are generated via the Alert Viewer system on the NHS Spine Portal. It is worth noting that the Alert Viewer will not allow alerts to be closed by the same individual who created them, therefore practices may wish the Privacy Officer to be an appropriate member of staff who will not normally access SCRs.

For further information on setting up the Privacy Officer see the Vision 3 SCR Viewing guidance at http://systems.hscic.gov.uk/scr/implement/viewing