How should I communicate with patients as a private GP?

When determining methods of communication with patients, for asynchronous communication private GPs need to strike a balance between simplicity, data security and patient preference.  

Whilst traditional email is often a preference for patients, there are reasonable concerns around this method of communication; emails tend to remain accessible and unencrypted within a patients inbox, creating a risk in the event a patient’s emails get attacked.

Instead, for sensitive information (e.g. clinical results) most clinicians are increasingly relying on sharing communication via time-boxed web links, sent either via SMS or email (End to end encrypted). These tend to come with a number of benefits:

What are the best tools for patient communication?

The most popular communication tools are typically those integrated with clinical systems, as these reduce the need for duplicate data entry (and potential mistakes), and they can be setup to create audit trails within the clinical record.

With EMIS Web, there are a number of integrated SMS and Email tools, that facilitate both 1-to-1 and 1-to-many communication.

Features to consider when selecting a tool include:

Tools to consider are Accurx, Hero Health, Mjog and iPlato.

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What about for practitioner to practitioner communication?

All private GPs should now be able to obtain NHS mail accounts. This is the best mechanism for ensuring safe and secure email correspondence.

NHSmail is a free, secure email system that is available to all CQC-registered care providers in England who have achieved Approaching Standards on the Data Security and Protection Toolkit.

NHSmail is a secure email service which means that data can be sent safely and securely to other email addresses which meet the same high standards of accreditation. NHSmail also allows users to securely exchange information with insecure or non-accredited email services via the NHSmail encryption feature.

For more information, see the NHS Digital website.