Please wear a mask when attending the surgery. Obtaining PPE is both difficult and costly to the NHS at the moment. Please help where you can by bringing your own mask and reusing masks where it is safe to do so.

Welcome to Sibford Surgery

Our small, friendly practice was first established in the village of Sibford Gower more than 100 years ago. We have two doctors and a full complement of ancillary staff working from the surgery. There are facilities for the disabled, and a dispensary to supply medicines to most of our patients.

This website has been produced to welcome you to the practice and is designed for the benefit of present and prospective patients, to inform you of the services which we provide and how you may make the best use of them.

Please help us to offer you the best possible service by reading the information.

General Practice Transparency Notice for GPES Data for Pandemic Planning and Research (COVID-19)

This practice is supporting vital coronavirus (COVID-19) planning and research by sharing your data with NHS Digital.

The health and social care system is facing significant pressures due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. Health and care information is essential to deliver care to individuals, to support health, social care and other public services and to protect public health. Information will also be vital in researching, monitoring, tracking and managing the coronavirus outbreak. In the current emergency it has become even more important to share health and care information across relevant organisations. This practice is supporting vital coronavirus planning and research by sharing your data with NHS Digital, the national safe haven for health and social care data in England. 

Our legal basis for sharing data with NHS Digital

NHS Digital has been legally directed to collect and analyse patient data from all GP practices in England to support the coronavirus response for the duration of the outbreak. NHS Digital will become the controller under the General Data Protection Regulation 2016 (GDPR) of the personal data collected and analysed jointly with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, who has directed NHS Digital to collect and analyse this data under the COVID-19 Public Health Directions 2020 (COVID-19 Direction).

All GP practices in England are legally required to share data with NHS Digital for this purpose under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 (2012 Act). More information about this requirement is contained in the data provision notice issued by NHS Digital to GP practices.

Under GDPR our legal basis for sharing this personal data with NHS Digital is Article 6(1)(c) - legal obligation. Our legal basis for sharing personal data relating to health, is Article 9(2)(g) – substantial public interest, for the purposes of NHS Digital exercising its statutory functions under the COVID-19 Direction.

The type of personal data we are sharing with NHS Digital

The data being shared with NHS Digital will include information about patients who are currently registered with a GP practice or who have a date of death on or after 1 November 2019 whose record contains coded information relevant to coronavirus planning and research. The data contains NHS Number, postcode, address, surname, forename, sex, ethnicity, date of birth and date of death for those patients. It will also include coded health data which is held in your GP record such as details of:

• diagnoses and findings
• medications and other prescribed items
• investigations, tests and results
• treatments and outcomes
• vaccinations and immunisations

How NHS Digital will use and share your data

NHS Digital will analyse the data they collect and securely and lawfully share data with other appropriate organisations, including health and care organisations, bodies engaged in disease surveillance and research organisations for coronavirus response purposes only. These purposes include protecting public health, planning and providing health, social care and public services, identifying coronavirus trends and risks to public health, monitoring and managing the outbreak and carrying out of vital coronavirus research and clinical trials. The British Medical Association, the Royal College of General Practitioners and the National Data Guardian are all supportive of this initiative.

NHS Digital has various legal powers to share data for purposes relating to the coronavirus response. It is also required to share data in certain circumstances set out in the COVID-19 Direction and to share confidential patient information to support the response under a legal notice issued to it by the Secretary of State under the Health Service (Control of Patient Information) Regulations 2002 (COPI Regulations).

Legal notices under the COPI Regulations have also been issued to other health and social care organisations requiring those organisations to process and share confidential patient information to respond to the coronavirus outbreak. Any information used or shared during the outbreak under these legal notices or the COPI Regulations will be limited to the period of the outbreak unless there is another legal basis for organisations to continue to use the information. 

Data which is shared by NHS Digital will be subject to robust rules relating to privacy, security and confidentiality and only the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the coronavirus purpose will be shared. Organisations using your data will also need to have a clear legal basis to do so and will enter into a data sharing agreement with NHS Digital. Information about the data that NHS Digital shares, including who with and for what purpose will be published in the NHS Digital data release register.

For more information about how NHS Digital will use your data please see the NHS Digital Transparency Notice for GP Data for Pandemic Planning and Research (COVID-19).

National Data Opt-Out

The application of the National Data Opt-Out to information shared by NHS Digital will be considered on a case by case basis and may or may not apply depending on the specific purposes for which the data is to be used. This is because during this period of emergency, the National Data Opt-Out will not generally apply where data is used to support the coronavirus outbreak, due to the public interest and legal requirements to share information.

Your rights over your personal data

To read more about the health and care information NHS Digital collects, its legal basis for collecting this information and what choices and rights you have in relation to the processing by NHS Digital of your personal data, see:

• the NHS Digital GPES Data for Pandemic Planning and Research (COVID-19) Transparency Notice
• the NHS Digital Coronavirus (COVID-19) Response Transparency Notice
• the NHS Digital General Transparency Notice
• how NHS Digital looks after your health and care information

Notice: 

Some of our patients may be aware that the NHS will shortly begin running a scheme that ties several general practices local to each other into networks called PCNs (Primary Care Networks).

After careful consideration we have decided not to join a PCN.

We have several reasons for this. The foremost is that we believe it will take us away from providing direct patient care and face to face GP appointments – something which is greatly valued by patients. Our training and skill lies in general practice and we feel we will best serve our patients by continuing to provide an easily accessible and high quality, personal service to them.

Please bring any questions you have regarding this to our attention.

We would prefer that you call the surgery where possible, but please feel free to use the eConsult service

Where to turn to for advice?

There are a number of places to turn to for information to help you choose the best health service for your needs.

Choose Well