Health and Social Care Information Centre failed to log requests of up to 700,000 patients not to pass on details and says issue ‘may take some time’ to resolve

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

The body responsible for releasing NHS patient data to organisations has admitted information about patients has been shared against their wishes, it has emerged.

Requests by up to 700,000 patients for details from their records not to be passed on, registered during preparations for the creation of a giant medical database, have not been met.

But the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) told MPs that it “does not currently have the resources or processes to handle such a significant level of objection” and it also encountered technical issues over logging the preferences.

Patients registered their objections during the development of the controversial care data system but the plans were shelved in March 2014.

The admission was made in a letter to the House of Commons health select committee in February from HSCIC chair Kingsley Manning, who admitted it “may take some time” to resolve the issue.

Dr Beth McCarron-Nash, who leads on care data for the General Practitioners Committee (GPC), told health sector journal Pulse: “Obviously, if there are technical difficulties that HSCIC are experiencing they must be resolved, and it is their responsibility to make sure patients are protected. But basically it’s a mess.”

Phil Booth, director of data rights advocacy group medConfidential told Pulse: “The material fact is, hundreds of thousands of people, last January, February, March, exercised their right to opt out of having their data passed on by the HSCIC, and that has not been respected.”

• This article was amended on 8 June 2015 to delete an inaccurate reference to NHS patient data being released to organisation “including insurance companies”.

