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Impact on Teesside is a partnership between Alliance Psychological Services Ltd, Middlesbrough and Stockton Mind, Insight Healthcare and Tees, Esk and Wear Valley NHS Foundation Trust. The partnership was formed to jointly provide a Psychological Wellbeing and Therapy service for residents of Teesside.

Your information and what we do with it
Impact on Teesside takes your confidentiality and privacy rights very seriously and is required to comply with the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) 2016, the Data Protection Act (DPA) 2018 and the Common Law Duty of Confidentiality. Impact on Teesside have policies and procedures in place to ensure that they:

  • Process information lawfully
  • Only obtain adequate and relevant information
  • Ensure information is accurate
  • Not keep information longer than necessary
  • Process in accordance with your rights
  • Keep your information secure
  • Not transfer your information without adequate protection

Why do we collect information about you?
Your information is used to guide and record the treatment and care you receive. This information is vital in helping to ensure you receive good quality care.

Keeping records means that:

  • We have all the information necessary for assessing your needs and providing excellent care
  • Your concerns can be properly investigated if you raise a complaint
  • Professionals involved in your care have accurate and up-to-date information
  • Accurate information about you is available if you:
    • Move to another area
    • Need to use another service
    • See a different healthcare professional

Impact on Teesside must identify a legal basis for any processing of personal information. The legal basis usually relied upon when providing psychological support is:

Article 6(1)(c) processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which the controller is subject

Article 6(1)(e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller

Article 9(2)(h) processing is necessary for the purposes of preventive or occupational medicine, for the assessment of the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or the management of health or social care systems and services on the basis of Union or Member State law or pursuant to contract with a health professional and subject to the conditions and safeguards referred to in paragraph 3

However, all processing activities carried out by Impact on Teesside are assessed and a legal basis established for each one is identified before processing takes place. This is done by completing a data protection impact assessment. If a legal basis cannot be identified, processing will not take place.

What information do we collect from you?
Our staff working with you – such as psychological therapists, administrative staff and other staff involved in your care – keep records about your health and any care and treatment you receive. This may include:

  • Basic details such as name, address, date of birth, and contact numbers
  • Notes and reports about your health and any treatment, care or support you need and receive
  • Relevant information from other professionals
  • Sensitive personal data – for example, details of why you would like to seek support from Impact on Teesside, details of a disability, details of support you may have had in the past and notes written by therapists following sessions or after other contact with us
  • Dates of appointments
  • Family Details – for example details of other family members with whom you have given us consent to speak to

Your records are electronic and will be held on an online information management system and secure network. The information management system is access controlled and requires a unique username and password. The user must then verify the credentials before being allowed access. All access to records is monitored and checked regularly.

Who might we share your information with?
Your information will be shared with the staff who are caring for you and are providing treatment to you.

Impact on Teesside and other agencies work together so we may need to share information with other professionals and services involved in your care. For instance, when your therapist needs to discuss your case with other professionals (who do not work for Impact on Teesside) in order to plan your care. We do this in order to provide the most appropriate treatment and support for you, or when the welfare of other people is involved. We will only share information in this way if it is considered necessary and wherever possible we have your permission (please see exceptions below).

If you change your mind about your consent, please discuss this with your therapist as this could have implications in how you receive your care.

However, a person’s right to confidentiality is not absolute and there may be other circumstances when we must share information with other agencies. In these circumstances we are not required to seek your consent, however, we will always endeavour discuss our concerns with you and the reason we feel that information needs to be shared. Examples of this are:

  • If there is a concern that you are putting yourself at risk of serious harm
  • If there is concern that you are putting another person at risk of serious harm
  • If there is concern that a child/young person is suffering or likely to suffer significant harm
  • If we have been instructed to do so by a Court
  • If the information is essential for the investigation of a serious crime
  • If your information falls within a category that needs to be notified for public health or other legal reasons

Your personal information will only be used for purposes that benefit treatment and care. It will never be used for marketing or insurance purposes.

If you have accessed any services delivered by Tees, Esk and Wear Valley NHS Foundation Trust (TEWV) such as the crisis team, our community link workers may access your notes and share any relevant information with the service. This is to ensure we have a full picture of what is going on for you and what support you have received previously, and to help us identify suitable treatment options for you. To aid the referral process into TEWV services, our community link workers may also share relevant information about the support you have accessed at Impact on Teesside with the service you are being referred to. Any access to records will be documented on your notes.

We share information about you (your personal data) for the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) Data Set, to help achieve better outcomes and experiences of care.

The data set collects information about demographics (such as postcode, date of birth, ethnic category), referral, treatment and outcomes details. The data is securely sent to NHS Digital which is the central organisation that receives the same data from all NHS-funded IAPT services across England. The data set is used to produce anonymised national reports that show summary numbers of, for instance, numbers of patients referred to different IAPT services across the country as well as average waiting times and outcomes. The reports help the NHS to improve the care it provides to you and other patients. No information that could reveal your identity is used in these reports. The data may be linked with other sources of data to support a wider range of information within these national reports, such as to investigate the relationship between IAPT services and other care services.

For more information about how NHS Digital uses IAPT data including their lawful basis for processing, how long they hold it for and your rights, please see our GDPR register.

You have the right to opt out of your information being used for research and planning purposes, this is referred to as the national data opt out. For further information please visit the following website: https://www.nhs.uk/your-nhs-data-matters/. Alternatively, you can call 0300 303 5678.

More information about the IAPT Data Set can be found on the NHS Digital IAPT web pages.

Enhancing our services and performance
To help us monitor our performance, evaluate and develop the services we provide, it is necessary to review and share basic information, for example with commissioning teams. You can be assured that we do not use information that may identify you. The information we share is anonymised and aggregated and all access to and use of this information is strictly controlled. We never use this information to make decisions about your direct treatment and the care you receive.

What do we do with your information?
Everyone working in Health and Social Care has a legal duty to keep information about you confidential. Anyone who receives information from us is also under a legal duty to keep it confidential.

As well as ensuring you receive the appropriate care, your records can also provide us with an important source of information when we need to:

  • Review the care we provide to ensure it is of the highest standard
  • Investigate complaints, legal claims or untoward incidents
  • Prepare statistics about services
  • Audit accounts and services
  • Conduct research and development to help us look after the health of the general public and to make sure our services can meet future demand
  • Teach and train health and social care professionals

Unless we are investigating a complaint you have made, the records we use for the above purposes will not include any of your personal details. Sometimes for statistical, research or training purposes it is helpful to have more details as this can help us to identify particular trends or needs. However, we will only use your personal information in this way if you give us your consent.

How we store and secure your information
Your information is stored electronically. At present your information is stored on Impact on Teesside’s in-house system. All other information about you is pseudonymised or anonymised and aggregated and is stored on Impact on Teesside’s internal network and access to this information is restricted.

All of the clinical systems used by Impact on Teesside are implemented with robust information security safeguards to protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of personal confidential information.

All staff must adhere to a confidentiality agreement as part of their contract with Impact on Teesside and all staff must comply with the various security operating procedures. Any breach of these is treated seriously, and could result in disciplinary action, including dismissal.

How we transfer your information
Impact on Teesside applies best practice according to the Data Protection Act to transfer any information about you, securely. For example; electronic information, where appropriate, is sent via an Impact on Teesside approved encrypted method, to ensure it cannot be intercepted, read, or tampered with during transmission. Hard copy information is posted via recorded delivery.

https://digital.nhs.uk/about-nhs-digital/our-work/...

We only keep your personal information as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we hold it for, including satisfying any legal or reporting requirements. This will be for a specified amount of time.

That length of time may vary depending on the reasons for which we are processing the personal information and whether we have a legal or contractual obligation to keep it for a certain amount of time, in this case it is for a minimum of 8 years.

Once the retention period has expired, the information will be appraised and either retained further with a clear justifiable reason for doing so, or disposed of in line with NHS guidelines.

How can I access the information you hold about me?
You have a right to see the information we hold about you, both on paper or electronically. Your request must be made in writing or by email and we will request proof of identity before we can disclose personal information.

Further information
To learn more about how Impact on Teesside uses, manages and maintains confidentiality of patient information, please speak to your therapist, or contact:

The Information Governance Manager
Impact on Teesside
24 Yarm Road
Stockton-on-Tees
TS18 3NA

Tel: 01642 573924
Email: enquries@impactonteesside.com

Caldicott Guardian
The Caldicott Guardian is a senior person within Impact on Teesside who makes sure that personal information about who uses the service is used legally, ethically and appropriately and that confidentiality is maintained. They play a key role in ensuring that Impact on Teesside satisfies the highest practical standards for handling personal information. The Caldicott Guardians main concern is information relating to patients and their care, but the need for confidentiality extends to others including their relatives, carers, staff and others. If you would like to discuss any of the above with the Caldicott Guardian, but not as part of a complaint process, please contact them on CaldicottGuardian@impactonteesside.com.

Covid-19
As part of the governments test and trace system we are obligated to share contact details of any person that accessed Impact on Teesside premises when there has been a suspected or verified case. Only names and contact details will be shared.