Data Protection Privacy Notice – Patients

In providing your dental care and treatment at the Wooding Dental Group, we will ask for information about you and your health. Occasionally, we may receive information from other providers who have been involved in providing your care. This privacy notice describes the type of personal information we hold, why we hold it and what we do with it.

Information that we collect

We may collect the following information about you:

• Personal details such as your name, date of birth, national insurance number, NHS number, address, telephone number and email address
• Information about your dental and general health, including
• Clinical records made by dentists and other dental professionals involved with your care and treatment
• X-rays, clinical photographs, digital scans of your mouth and teeth, and study models
• Medical and dental histories
• Treatment plans and consent
• Notes of conversations with you about your care
• Dates of your appointments
• Details of any complaints you have made and how these complaints were dealt with
• Correspondence with other health professionals or institutions
• Details of the fees we have charged, the amounts you have paid and some payment details

Our Data Protection Officer, Charlie Ding, is responsible for keeping the information we hold about you secure. He ensures that the practice complies with data protection requirements to ensure that we collect, use, store and dispose of your information responsibly.

Those at the practice who have access to your information include dentists and other dental professionals involved with your care and treatment. The reception staff and practice manager are responsible for the management and administration of the practice.

How we use your information

To provide you with the dental care and treatment that you need, we require up-to-date and accurate information about you.

We will share your information with the NHS in connection with your dental treatment.

We will seek your preference for how we contact you about your dental care. Our usual methods of contact are telephone, text message, email, or letter. 

If we wish to use your information for dental research or dental education, we will discuss this with you and seek your consent. Depending on the purpose and if possible, we will anonymise your information. If this is not possible, we will inform you and discuss your options.

Sharing information

Your information is normally used only by those working at the practice but there may be instances where we need to share it, for example with:

• Your doctor
• The hospital or community dental services or other health professionals caring for you
• NHS Business Service Authority
• Local health board
• The Department for Work and Pensions and its agencies, where you are claiming exemption or remission from NHS charges
• Private dental schemes of which you are a member.
• If you require treatment elsewhere and wish us to refer you, i.e., to a specialist either NHS or privately

We will only disclose your information on a need-to-know basis and will limit any information that we share to the minimum necessary.

In certain circumstances or if required by law, we may need to disclose your information to a third party not connected with your health care, including HMRC or other law enforcement or government agencies.

Keeping your information safe

We store your personal information securely on our practice computer system. Your information cannot be accessed by those who do not work at the practice. They understand their legal responsibility to maintain confidentiality and follow practice procedures to ensure this.

We take precautions to ensure security of the practice premises via an alarm system which is set on leaving the practice at the end of the day. Only those working at the practice have access to the alarm code. They understand their legal responsibility to maintain confidentiality and follow practice procedures to ensure this.

We use high-quality specialist dental software to record and use your personal information safely and effectively. Our computer system has a secure audit trail and we back-up information routinely.

We keep your records for a minimum of 11 years after the date of your last visit to the practice or until you reach the age of 25 years, whichever is longer. If you are a continued patient at the practice, your records are kept indefinitely. 

Taking payments.

When making payments using your debit or credit cards, we do not write down the card details and we do not hold this information at any time in the practice. We do not pass this information onto any third party. Whilst making payments in practice using our card machine it is handed directly to the patient to input their pin number. Our staff will never ask for a pin number. If we take payments over the phone, the staff will never repeat the number out loud, and neither will they write it down.

We accept payments using cash, debit/credit card or bacs transfer.

Access to your information and other rights

Patients have a right to access the information that we hold about them and to receive a copy. Requests should be submitted to the practice in writing or by email. We do not usually charge you for copies of your information; if we pass on a charge, we will explain the reasons.

You can also request us to:

• Correct any information that you believe is inaccurate or incomplete. If we have disclosed that information to a third party, we will let them know about the change
• Erase information we hold although you should be aware that, for legal reasons, we may be unable to erase certain information (for example, information about your dental treatment)
• Stop using your information – for example, sending you reminders for appointments or information about our service
• Supply your information electronically to another dentist.

If you do not agree

If you do not wish us to use your personal information as described, you should discuss the matter with your dentist. If you object to the way that we collect and use your information, we may not be able to continue to provide your dental care.

The Wooding Dental Group is registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). A certificate of proof is displayed on the notice board in the patient waiting area of each practice.

If you have any concerns about how we use your information and you do not feel able to discuss it with your dentist or anyone at the practice, you should contact:

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF

(0303 123 1113 or 01625 545745)