The National Health Service (Personal Medical Services Agreements) Regulations 2015

Patient online services E+W

64.—(1) A contractor which provides essential services must promote and offer to its registered patients the facility for a patient to—

(a) book, view, amend, cancel and print appointments online;

(b) order repeat prescriptions for drugs, medicines or appliances online; and

(c) view and print a list of any drugs, medicines or appliances in respect of which the patient has a repeat prescription,

in a manner which is capable of being electronically integrated with the computerised clinical systems of the contractor's practice using appropriate systems authorised by the Board.

(2) The requirements in paragraph (1) do not apply where the contractor does not have access to computer systems and software which would enable it to offer the online services described in that paragraph to its registered patients.

[F1 (3) A contractor must when complying with the requirements in paragraph (1)(a)—

(a) ensure that a minimum of 25% of its appointments per day during core hours are made available for online booking, whether or not those appointments are booked online, by telephone or in person, to include all appointments which must be made available for direct booking by NHS 111 in accordance with paragraph 16B of Part 2 of Schedule 2 to these Regulations; and

(b) consider whether it is necessary, in order to meet the needs of its registered patients, to increase the proportion of appointments which are available for its registered patients to book online and, if so, increase that number.

(3A) In the case of appointments required to be made available for direct booking by NHS 111, in accordance with paragraph 16B of Part 2 of Schedule 2 to these Regulations, those appointments can be released to be booked by a contractor’s registered patients by any means in the two hour period within core hours prior to the appointment time, or such other period agreed pursuant to a local arrangement, if they have not been booked by NHS 111 prior to this time.]

F2 (4) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(5) A contractor must promote and offer to its registered patients, in circumstances where the medical records of its registered patients are held on the contractor's computerised clinical systems, the facility for any such patient to access online all information from the patient's medical record which is held in coded form unless—

(a) in the reasonable opinion of the contractor, access to such information would not be in the patient's best interests because it is likely to cause serious harm—

(i) to the patient's physical or mental health, or

(ii) to the physical or mental health of any other person;;

(b) the information includes any reference to a third party who has not consented to its disclosure; or

(c) the information in the patient's medical record contains a free text entry and it is not possible under the contractor's computerised clinical systems to separate that free text entry from the other information in that medical record which is held in coded form.

[F3 (5A) In addition to complying with the requirements in paragraphs (1) and (5), a contractor must offer to its newly registered patients, the facility to access online all information entered onto the patient’s medical record on or after 1st October 2019 in so far as its computerised clinical systems and redaction software allows unless—

(a) in the reasonable opinion of the contractor, access to such information would not be in the patient’s best interests because it is likely to cause serious harm to—

(i) the patient’s physical or mental health, or

(ii) the physical or mental health of any other person; or

(b) the information includes a reference to any third party who has not consented to its disclosure.]

F4 (6) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

F5 (7) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(8) Where the contractor has a practice website, the contractor must also promote and offer to its registered patients the facility referred to in paragraph (1)(a) and (b) on that practice website.

[F6 (9) In this regulation—

(a) “local arrangement” means an arrangement between the contractor and the Board as to the timeframe within which appointments not booked by NHS 111 can be released for booking by the contractor’s registered patients; and

(b) “newly registered patient” means a person who becomes a registered patient on or after 1st October 2019.]

Textual Amendments

F1 Reg. 64(3)(3A) substituted for reg. 64(3) (1.10.2019) by The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/1137), regs. 1(2), 23(a)

F2 Reg. 64(4) omitted (1.10.2019) by virtue of The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/1137), regs. 1(2), 23(b)

F3 Reg. 64(5A) inserted (1.10.2019) by The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/1137), regs. 1(2), 23(c)

F4 Reg. 64(6) omitted (1.10.2019) by virtue of The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/1137), regs. 1(2), 23(b)

F5 Reg. 64(7) omitted (1.10.2018) by virtue of The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2018 (S.I. 2018/844), regs. 1(2), 11

F6 Reg. 64(9) substituted (1.10.2019) by The National Health Service (General Medical Services Contracts and Personal Medical Services Agreements) (Amendment) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/1137), regs. 1(2), 23(d)