Enhanced Summary Care Records

Most patients will have a Summary Care Record, as this is a default option unless you have chosen to ‘opt out’.

The basic summary care record will provide core information on acute and repeat medication, and allergies.

We would encourage all patients to consider opting in to the Enhanced Summary Care Record, also known as the Summary Care Record with Additional Information – but you need to take action to make this happen.

The Enhanced Summary Care Record requires your explicit consent for us to create it, and then to make it available for authorised healthcare staff to have access to it

It will contain additional information on your key medical problems, for example, if you have Atrial Fibrillation or Diabetes, this will be a ‘problem heading’ on your medical records and will then show on your Enhanced Summary Care Record. This additional ‘problem’ based information is particularly helpful in an emergency situation, which is typically when the Summary Care Record is accessed, and will enable those healthcare professionals to have as much key information available to them as possible at that critical point in time.

If you would like to consent to having an Enhanced Summary Care Record, please let the Reception team know when you are next in the practice – we can take verbal consent from you, but will need to do this in person. If you are not able to come in to the practice, please send us a brief (signed) letter explicitly consenting to this.