Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has been made of the potential merits of ensuring pharmacists have both read and write access to medical records to ensure a consistent and comprehensive record of care.

The Department, NHS England and NHS Improvement, NHSX and NHS Digital are currently considering this access for pharmacists.

In some areas, medical records are already shared between medical professionals to support locally commissioned services. Nationally, pharmacists have read access via a patient’s Summary Care Record. Following a successful pilot of the digital transfer between community pharmacy and general practitioner (GP) IT systems, when a patient has their NHS flu vaccination in a community pharmacy this information is sent electronically to the patient’s GP where known and is automatically recorded in the patient’s medical record. As access is extended, we are considering technical requirements, patient consent and data security to provide access to patient records as part of the integration of National Health Service IT systems.