NHS Digital to collect coronavirus data from general practice

NHS Digital has announced it will start collecting data on COVID-19 from general practice to ‘ease the burden’ on practices.

The fortnightly central data collection will support ‘planning, monitoring and research’ as part of the COVID-19 response, NHS Digital said.

Practices were asked to share confidential patient information with the Government in April to ‘support the secretary of state’s response’ to Covid-19.

NHS Digital advised that the data collection is being done in line with requests from the BMA and RCGP.

In the announcement, it explained: ‘GPs are being overwhelmed with requests for data to support the response to coronavirus. This collection will allow more time for GPs to care for patients.’

Practices need to register their participation on the Calculating Quality Reporting Service (CQRS) by 27 May and update their practice’s transparency notice on their website to ensure patients are informed. 

The collection is a temporary measure that is set to end on 30 September subject to review.

General practice data, which will be collected via the existing GP extraction service infrastructure, will only be shared to ‘support the coronavirus response’ in line with ‘robust information governance standards and independent oversight’, NHS Digital said.

‘The GP profession will also be involved before data is made available in response to any request’, NHS Digital added.

It has provided a ‘template GP transparency notice’ so that practices can let patients know about the data collection via their websites.

NHS Digital clinical lead for GP data Dr Peter Short said: ‘Data is crucial to enabling an effective response to the coronavirus pandemic and will help the health and social care system and researchers to save lives. 

‘This emergency data collection will free up time for GPs to spend with patients and ensure that the NHS can use data appropriately and transparently to plan and manage services effectively and potentially develop and target new interventions and treatments.’