Patient Rights and Responsibilities

Your Rights

• We aim to provide the best possible service to all our patients.
• We respect the confidentiality of individual patients and provide open access to information on services and treatment.
• You are entitled to information and practical help towards healthier living.
• You are entitled to be treated as a person not a case.
• People have a right to expect honesty, respect and the preservation of their dignity.
• You are entitled to access, with safeguards, to information held about you by the NHS; and to be sure that this information will be kept confidential.  You also have a right of access to medical reports made for insurance or employment purposes.  All personal records in the NHS are confidential and all persons in the Service must abide by the code of practice on confidentiality or personal health information.
• You are entitled to be involved so far as is practical in making decisions about your own care, and wherever possible, given choices including choice of GP, the right to give or withhold consent to medical treatment, the right to decide whether or not to participate in medical research and student training.

Your Responsibilities

• You should share in the responsibility for your own health.
• Care for yourself when appropriate (for example you can treat yourself at home for common ailments such as coughs, colds and sore throats).
• Keep your appointment or let us know as soon as possible if you cannot keep it.  Book routine appointments in plenty of time.  Help us by turning up on time and with everything you need.
• Give notice if you change your address.
• Return any equipment no longer needed.