Liverpool Care Pathway - Data Is Power

Do they care dot data? You bet they care dot data! But will they dare dot data?





This is The Bolton News –

A spokesman for the Bolton Clinical Commissioning Group said: “People should be reassured this is a national NHS programme, which will adhere to the highest standards of privacy and confidentiality.

"The information will be stored in a secure way and the HSCIC is bound by legislation to ensure confidential data is protected at all times.”

People were not reassured and the roll out was postponed.

The Mail claimed victory as theirs but MP, David Davis, urged caution and concern...

The NHS (National socialist Health Service) said the project would be postponed until the autumn while it runs an awareness campaign, but it would remain an opt-out rather than an opt-in scheme, just as organ harvesting has become and is becoming. Civil liberties are being trodden underfoot.

- Lancaster Guardian

Well, here we are, half-way through the summer, and I don't see that anyone is any more aware than they were. What campaign has proceeded, if there has been one, has been on a par with the laughable but not funny Common Market misinformation campaign that had  co-opted everyone in and culminated in a referendum in 1975 in which everyone voted Yes or No to stay in without realising the significance of that.

The Times actually published a letter from some of the country’s most senior doctors and health executives in defence of and justification for the Dot Data plans.

From afar, Newspoint Africa reported –

After Dr. Gordon Gancz decided to opt out all his patients from a NHS scheme to extract their details, Health Service officials have threatened to shut down his GP surgery.

Dr. Gancz has been practicing medical services for almost 40 years and he accused the NHS of bullying doctors and patients to fall in line with their scheme. The scheme will automatically extract private medical information of patients until they opt out. Dr. Gancz has received a threatening email that if he breaches the contract, he will face a shutdown of his practice.

Some local GP surgeries made opt out leaflets available...

This is The Visitor –

Local GP surgeries in Morecambe and Lancaster are offering leaflets allowing patients to opt out of having their details uploaded.

Care.data say the database will enable them to assess diseases, examine new drugs on the market and identify infection outbreaks, as well as monitor the performance of the NHS. But Lesley Archer, of Rhylstone Drive, Heysham, who cares for 88-year-old Robert Nightingale, is worried no-one knows about it. She said: “I had a leaflet put through my door but I don’t know anyone else who has had one.

“All your medical records will be sent from your GP to a giant central database and you have to actively opt out to prevent that happening, rather than consent to get involved.

“The delay is so that people can be brainwashed really.

“The NHS haven’t got a good record on keeping things confidential.”

NHS England agreed to delay the roll-out of Care.data by six months until the autumn amid criticism of how it has run the public information campaign about the project.

“The NHS haven’t got a good record on keeping things confidential.”

How's this for confidentiality, even if the records have been, supposedly, anonymised...?

This is HSJ –

The medical records of almost 50 million NHS hospital patients have been sold for insurance purposes, it has been reported.

The revelation comes less than a week after controversial plans to share medical records were delayed until later this year.

Both the British Medical Association and the Royal College of GPs have warned that patients are being kept in the dark about the plans.

Dot Data is an extension to a centralised database of what has already been proceeding at a local level. The Electronic Palliative Care Coordination System (EPaCCS), amongst others reported in these pages, is already synced with the Death Lists.

It all seems such reasonable and innocuous stuff, but perception is 99% of the law. When the Law comes knocking at your door, the composure of threat determines 99% of the response.

We are witnessing the coming together of a fascist regime and we are only half-way there.

We are witnessing the coming together of a fascist regime and nowhere is this being challenged.

This is -

Liverpool Care Pathway - Appointment With Death

This is HSJ –

What’s this? The police want greater access to confidential GP medical records without necessarily obtaining the prior consent of the individual concerned?

When NHS England’s plans to collate GP metadata from us all for research - and commercial - purposes took a faltering step forward in February, it hit a wall of tabloid hysteria and stepped back to rethink devices for voter reassurance.

Big Brother

Professional and public suspicion - reflected in website analysis and comment - is a mixture of paranoia and concern that such data is open to abuse or exploitation, commercial or otherwise.

Edward Snowden’s revelations were fresh in the public mind, reminding us all just how invasive Big Brother technology now is, and not just at GCHQ level either.

Late for supper one night I phoned my son to say “we’re on our way”. “No you’re not, you’re still parked outside the house,” he replied. My iPhone tracker gave me away.

Back in February David Davis, the libertarian Tory MP, challenged health minister Dan Poulter.

He confirmed that police pursuing serious crime will have “backdoor” access - which was Mr Snowden’s complaint about spy agency dealings with Google - to the NHS’s new arm’s length database, even the records of patients who have opted out. Previously they would have had to trace a suspect’s GP.

Big Brother is a public guardian who knows better than we what is best for us and will take charge of us and our affairs for our own good. 1984 was 30 years off the mark and we are walking into Big Brother's world with a smile and a grin to welcome him with arms open wide.

God is watching us on a CCTV monitor.

How will police respect Care Dot Data? The same way they respect any and every opportunity that comes their way...?

At our scheme recently, a client, a vulnerable adult with mental health issues, became involved in a misunderstanding. An altercation ensued. Our client attempted to explain himself and, when this failed, he took it upon himself to phone 101 on his mobile phone. Just then, a police patrol car happened to pass by.

The two officers in the car arrested our client and he was taken to holding cells where he had all his possessions removed from him. A Solicitor and Appropriate Adult were appointed.

At first, our client chose to remain silent. The Appropriate Adult persuaded our client to explain what had happened and what his intentions had been. Our client did so.

Our client's mother phoned the following morning. She had been trying to phone her son and he was not answering. At her request and our joint concerns for his well-being, we used the master key to check his room.

At no time were we or his mental health team informed by police of what had happened to our client. We learnt from other clients that two uniformed officers had entered the house the previous evening, letting themselves in, and used a key to enter our client's room.

Our client returned later that morning to his home and began preparing himself a meal. He had not eaten.

He had just attended an appointment with his mental health team. He had not told them, he said, because he felt shamed by his arrest. No, he did not know police had come to his home. No, he had not given permission for them to use his keys.

Our Service Manager is looking into this reported intrusion and uninvited entry into the house and invasion of our client's room.

This is quite extraordinary. There was neither warrant obtained nor was there consent to enter supplied. This was an act of trespass for which explanation shall be sought.

At the end of the day, will it all be down to plausible deniability? Who is to be believed: a fine upstanding officer of the law, or a fruit and nut mental case? 

Really?

Lesley Archer said, “The NHS haven’t got a good record on keeping things confidential.”

The NHS haven’t got a good record on keeping things, full stop.

Reporting on Wirral Hospital, home of the Wirral Integrated End of Life Pathway, here is the Liverpool Echo –

More than 1,500 cancer patients’ medical records were mixed up in a computer bungle at a Wirral hospital, the ECHO can reveal.

The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre admits there was an error in the way they uploaded some data into a system they use called PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication System) which meant that as many as 1,598 medical records ended up containing some wrong information.

The hospital said there was no risk of patients being misdiagnosed – told they have cancer when they have not – as the affected scans and X-rays are for planning treatment only. Their patients have already had diagnostic scans.

The problem is said to mainly affect Clatterbridge, with a smaller number of records being affected at other trusts who have the same network.

These include the Royal Liverpool Hospital, Liverpool Women’s, Liverpool Heart and Chest, The Walton Centre, Fazakerley, Alder Hey, St Helen’s and Knowsley, Warrington and Halton and Southport and Ormskirk hospital.

And this is BBC News Berkshire – 

A woman who was wrongly told she had Alzheimer's and cancer when her medical notes were mixed up with those of her dead husband has received an apology.

Kathy Patient, 71, from Bracknell, Berkshire, went for a CT scan at Frimley Park Hospital last Friday due to heart problems and blood clots.

She said before the procedure the nurse was insistent she had a number of other conditions.

Mrs Patient said: "The nurse said you've had [a CT scan] done before. I said, 'no I haven't'; she said, 'yes you have'.

'Started crying'

"She asked me to confirm my date of birth and name. She left me for few minutes, then came back and said, 'you've got Alzheimer's and cancer'. I said, 'no I haven't'; she said, 'yes you have'."

Yes, you have; you have Alzheimer’s and you can’t remember, poor dear...

The nurse later returned and admitted she had mixed up Mrs Patient's records with those of her 80-year-old husband - who died 18 months ago.

The hospital, which sent a bouquet of flowers, said it was "extremely sorry" and was taking the matter "very seriously".

"We are currently investigating how Mrs Patient's late husband's history became attached to hers on our electronic radiology record," it said.

At a centralised level, on a national scale, the ‘Big Guardian’ element aside, this has ponderous considerations and worrying implications of consequence and consequences.

Some further things to ponder upon -

Liverpool Care Pathway - The DES

Liverpool Care Pathway - A Land Of Confusion

Liverpool Care Pathway - When The Funding Had To Stop

Liverpool Care Pathway - The Palliative Option And Downsizing Care

Liverpool Care Pathway - After The Review, After Everything, They're STILL Killing People

Footnote:

The fact is that if the designs behind the Common Market are carried out, we are bound to be affected in every phase of our national life. There would be no national planning, except under the guidance of Continental planning—we shall not be able to deal with our own problems; we shall not be able to build up the country in the way we want to do, so far as I can see. I think we shall be subject to overall control and planning by others. That is my objection.
Earl Attlee, 1962