Mentally Disordered Offenders: Crimes of Violence

Effectively and securely linking health and non-health data is critical to delivering the Government’s health and wider missions.

Health and justice data can be linked in specific circumstances; the National Health Service already shares some data with the Ministry of Justice as part of the latter’s Better Outcomes through Linked Data (BOLD) programme. The programme uses de-identified data held in a Secure Data Environment. More information on BOLD is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ministry-of-justice-better-outcomes-through-linked-data-bold/ministry-of-justice-better-outcomes-through-linked-data-bold

Practical issues to sharing health data include how patient information can be stored and accessed safely. The Department of Health and Social Care and the National Health Service in England is moving to a system of ‘data access as default’ for secondary data uses, through the implementation of Secure Data Environments. These platforms allow approved users to analyse data without it having to leave the environment.

The chief legal issue is usually the absence of an appropriate basis for sharing: the main ones are explicit consent, a statutory requirement, or an overriding public interest. The Department of Health and Social Care is shortly to review the legislation relating to the sharing of patient data for research and planning and other secondary purposes, to ensure it supports sharing and access, where appropriate safeguards are in place.