because the information is not available.”
Although this movement of data is key to driving up the quality of care given to patients, it also creates problems for NHS trusts about how to effectively ensure data security.
“I think there are several elements which need to be kept in mind with data security. One is the maturity of the people working within the health service about taking data security seriously because IT systems are only as secure as the people who use them.
“At the moment, we have some of the most secure healthcare related IT systems in the world but if people take data which is securely locked in those secure systems, then store it on a insecure device such as a USB stick and then leave that in a supermarket car park, then that problem is to do with the people involved in the incident, not the technology.
Jul/Aug 10
“If the NHS trusts professionals enough to let them take a knife to someone they do not know, then it should also be able to trust other professionals not to lose the information we give them. Basically, NHS professionals need to take data security as seriously as they treat infection control, but this will only happen the more that they use it.
“Also, people need to realise that there will always be an occasional incident where something goes wrong and those occasional incidents should not mean that the NHS should miss out on all of the benefits which further expansion of ICT systems can bring.
“If you set ‘perfect’ as the only acceptable standard then are you are not going to be able to use computers at all and will have to go back to transporting lots of paper records around again, with the only reason for them not being stolen being that the wheel has come off the trolley that is required to haul them around.
“When I was CIO for the NHS, one of the data security incidents which made it into the national newspapers involved a junior doctor who had gone to the lavatory, put a set of patients notes on top of the cistern and promptly forgot about them and left them there.
“Somebody else followed him in there, picked up the records and instead of walking to reception and handing them in, went to a newspaper instead. So we had a major incident and that had nothing to do with electronic records.
“I would argue that our IT systems are infinitely more secure than paper records are, but of course the downside is that if there is a breach of an IT system, then the NHS is potentially facing the breach or loss of a million records. Losing a million paper records requires a van.”
NHS
professionals need to take data security as seriously as they treat infection control
nhe 67
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100