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NHS Information Governance Requirements Finalised
Prescriptions record sensitive personal health data and community pharmacies recognise their duty to handle personal information securely. This was reflected in the Contractual Framework introduced in 2005, but new provisions have been introduced that apply to all NHS providers, who must assure their PCTs that they manage personal information in compliance with NHS requirements. This must be done by completing the NHS Information Governance Toolkit, an online assessment tool, available at http://www.igt.connectingforhealth.nhs.uk/.
To help pharmacy contractors PSNC has worked with the Department of Health, NHS Connecting for Health, NHS Employers and the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain to develop a workbook and training booklet for pharmacy staff on the NHS Information Governance requirements. These are being posted to all pharmacies on the 22nd January and can be accessed online now in the Information Governance section of this website.
Timescales for Completion of the Requirements
All community pharmacies are required to complete an online baseline assessment against the requirements in the Information Governance Toolkit by 31 March 2010. This will provide a baseline for improvements to be carried out where necessary.
To do this, pharmacies will need to appoint an Information Governance (IG) Lead(s) who will complete the baseline assessment on the online Information Governance Toolkit. This is simply an honest evaluation of the pharmacy’s current position in regards to each requirement.
There are 18 information governance requirements for community pharmacy. The levels of achievement within each requirement range from zero to three.
It is recognised that for many of the requirements, whilst pharmacies already have processes in place that ensure the secure handling of information, these may not be fully documented. This means that pharmacies may not currently have the evidence needed to meet Level 1 or 2 of the NHS requirements. It is therefore accepted that for many pharmacies some or all of the requirements will need to be base-lined at ‘Level 0’.
So pharmacies must complete the baseline assessment by 31 March this year; then work to meet the requirements; by 31 March 2011 community pharmacies will be expected to attain Level 2 against each of the pharmacy information governance requirements.
Support
Implementing the requirements by the 2011 deadline is expected to be burdensome, as it has been for the GP surgeries and NHS organisations that have recently been through this process. As pharmacies handle sensitive information about NHS patients, there was no possibility that pharmacies could be exempted from these requirements. The priority for PSNC has therefore been to ensure that there are supporting resources available to make achieving compliance as efficient as possible and that funding properly reflects the costs of these changes.
As well as the workbook and training book, a range of downloadable templates have been developed to support meeting each requirement.
More information can be found in the Information Governance section of this website.
Posted 18 January 2010