South Warwickshire General Hospitals NHS Trust. Pot Calling Kettle Black

This post was written a number of months ago [30.9.08]. Dr Broadman requested that I remove it as she did not wish to use these counterarguments against the Trust. I now note that Dr Grumble et al are using the identical arguments back at the Trust - bit late in the day but there you go. I thought I would republish this post.

South Warwickshire NHS Trust are getting rid of their best doctors on the strength of frivolous accusations relating to sending patient data to their own Clinic. In the meantime, the NHS cannot keep their data confidential and continue to distribute data to all and sundry including Pulse. Here are the dulux lighter shade of pink board responsible for failing to allow elderly asian patients to have their say in whether their doctor should be fired. They talk about "Caring For Patients" yet they certainly did not care enough about the views of Asian patients. There has been no complaint regarding the above doctor. We ask the question, what rights do elderly asian patients have. After all, the Trust has kept details of this case away from each of them. Perhaps it is because elderly asians don't understand English so the Trust thinks " Why bother".

This is their equality and diversity details. We should all note that it is written in English so no elderly asian diabetic patient who speaks an Indian language can understand it. In this case, the asian elderly patients have had no say in what happens to their data. Because they are asian and elderly, the Trust seems to have omitted their views. Do they want their doctor sacked? Do they object to the manner in which data was simply transferred from one hospital to a clinic for their own benefit? Of course, they won't mind, but of course the Trust didn't bother asking them. The Trust made the decision for these patients. It is a bit like saying no elderly asian is entitled to a view. Where is patient choice here?

Infact, the same Trust who is now harassing Dr Broadman was starring in Computer Weekly sometime ago

"An NHS trust board has approved the sharing of smartcards, in breach of security policy under the £12.4bn NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT), because slow log-in times would restrict the time of doctors treating emergency patients. South Warwickshire General Hospitals NHS Trust has allowed some staff to share smartcards used to access patient records, after concluding that log-in times for systems were too long for high-activity areas such as Accident and Emergency"

Smart Card sharing which is a risk in data protection was approved by the Trust Board :) . This is what the Expert stated on the Trust board decision

"This short sentence and few words says much more that the words alone. It says that there can be no guarantee of the identity of someone accessing private records; it says that the integrity of log files and audit records is compromised because it can never be proven who accessed what and when; it says that there is a compromised accountability for the use of private data; it says that there is a blatent disregard for privacy and controls that are usually in place to mitigate the risk of privacy being violated. It also says that the system was not designed taking into account the requirements of a busy department to access data as expediciously as it needs to hence the perception of a need to circumvent security.

It's a disturbing story. What disturbs me most is the retort of "the monitoring process revealed no breaches of security." Monitoring what? It's a breach of security every single time a smartcard is shared. Those words alone make me go pale because they demonstrate a total lack of regard for process within an environment where privacy is critical.

I'm not finished yet on this one.

While we talk about harassing doctors on frivilous charges, we should note that the rest of the NHS cannot keep its data pants on.

Pulse Today revealed as follows

"Four NHS trusts in five have lost patient data or suffered a data security breach since the beginning of last year, Pulse can reveal.

Our investigation reveals the true scale of confidentiality breaches within the NHS, with trusts reporting more than 1,300 incidents since January 2007.

GPs warned the findings would further undermine confidence in plans for electronic care records, with many of the data breaches involving NHS IT.

Figures obtained the Freedom of Information Act from 162 PCTs, hospital trusts and NHS authorities showed that there had been 557 incidents of lost data and 794 breaches of confidentiality over the time period.

Just 32 out of 162 trusts surveyed said they had not had a data loss or security breach incident.

One PCT even managed to commit a fresh security breach in the process of replying to Pulse’s Freedom of Information request, sending us the names of patients whose records had been lost"

While there is no accountability for the NHS itself losing data or the management responsible for it, we now have Trust Boards harassing well meaning decent doctors.