Agenda item

We received the Adults Committee Forward Work Programme. In doing so, the following points were noted:

·         A workshop for the Select Committee is being held on Friday 26^th October 2018 at 10.00am regarding the requirements of the Gypsy and Traveller Assessment Needs.

·         A special meeting of the Adults Select Committee will be held on the 26^th November 2018.

The Vice Chair provided the Select Committee with an update on the report on the A to Z Social Care system of records, as follows:

·         County Councillors Brown and Pratt met with a number of service mangers and the Lead Systems Analyst.

·         There has been an integrated approach to the care service since about 2008.

·         About five to seven years ago, integration of record sharing included district nurses and community physiotherapists.

·         Three years ago a Flo record system started.

·         There are information sharing protocols with the health board.

·         The system provides access to the records listed under their own worker names and job titles.

·         Underneath this system is an A to Z system of records held on a drive.  The drive files come from manual files being placed on to the computer system.  In comparison, the health service still has a number of manual file records.  There are 3381 people on the system across all services.  The caseload per person is an average of 20.

·         The drive covers legacy and new information and is the prime source of records. In terms of a paper trail, the network drives are not the best system for a document management system but operate across the Council. There are 750,000 documents off the network drive into the share point.

·         The access to the A – Z system of adult social care records operates based on trust with induction training of staff and the signing of confidentiality agreements.

·         In Councillor Brown’s opinion, the main disadvantage of the system is that it lacks a computer paper trail.  Whilst ease of access on an A – Z system of all names may help in health care, it would be better if it had a computer generated document management monitoring system to monitor access to social care records and did not solely rely on staff trust and staff confidentiality agreements.

·         In Councillor Pratt’s opinion, the advantage of easy access to records outweighs the small risk of data breaches.

·         It is important in the current system to ask managers to keep records / monitor new staff and ensure that induction is at the outset prior to any access and includes signed confidentiality agreements and not to access any data before having received this training and unless relevant to the persons under their care.  It is also important to ensure that all current staff have up to date training in this area, have all signed, and abide by the confidentiality codes.

·         Under the GDPR, there is no longer a need for consent but adults with social care records have a right to be informed of the purposes of the data collection and a right to restrict it.  In terms of any restriction, it was noted that patients can ask for certain information to be restricted if they wish but this may have implications for their level of care.

·         In terms of how long records are kept, depends on the situation.  Children’s records are kept for longer. It can vary depending on the legal requirements for record keeping.

·         There is an all Wales system called the Welsh Community Care Information System (WCCIS), which eight or nine of the 22 Welsh authorities have moved into.  In terms of the future, the WCCIS has a more robust document management system with one E File per person but it is not a shared record for health and local authority.

·         Councillors Brown and Pratt would like the Select Committee to receive further updates on how we could improve our system in the future on the document management side from the Chief Officer for Social Care Safeguarding and Health, as the Chief Officer is a member of the WCCIS Board.

·         Councillors Brown and Pratt considered that it would be helpful if they could visit an authority with the WCCIS in place and report back their findings.

In response to the update, the Scrutiny Manager informed the Select Committee:

·         The Chief Officer for Social Care Safeguarding and Health sits on the WCCIS Board and confirmed that she is progressing with the idea that Monmouthshire County Council would join that system in due course.

·         A visit can be arranged for Members to view the system in operation with a view to the Members reporting back their findings to a future meeting of the Select Committee.  County Councillors Brown and Pratt would be the Select Committee’s representatives.