IM Smile aims to meet the requirements of the Data Protection Act 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the guidelines on the Information Commissioner’s website, as well as our professional guidelines and requirements.
You will be asked to provide personal information when joining the practice. The purpose of us processing this data is to provide optimum health care to you. The categories of data we process are:
Personal data for the purposes of staff and self-employed team member management
Personal data for the purposes of direct mail/email/text/other marketing
Special category data including health records for the purposes of the delivery of healthcare
Special category data including health records and details of criminal record checks for managing employees and contracted team members
We never pass your personal details to a third party unless we have a contract for them to process data on our behalf and will otherwise keep it confidential. If we intend to refer a patient to another practitioner or to secondary care such as a hospital, we will gain the individual’s permission before the referral is made and the personal data is shared.
Personal data is stored in the EU whether in digital or hard copy format
Personal data is stored in the US in digital format when the data storage company is certified with the EU-US Privacy Shield
Personal data is obtained when a patient joins the practice, when a patient is referred to the practice and when a patient subscribes to an email list
The lawful basis for processing special category data such as patients’ and employees’ health data is:
Processing is necessary for the purposes of preventative or occupational medicine, for assessing the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or management of health or social care systems and services on the basis of Union or Member State law or a contract with a health professional
The lawful basis of processing personal data such as name, address, email or phone number is:
Consent of the data subject
Processing is necessary for the performance of a contract with the data subject or to take steps to enter into a contract
The retention period for special data in patient records is a minimum of 10 years and maybe longer for complex records in order to meet our legal requirements. The retention period for staff records is 6 years. The retention periods for other personal data is 2 years after it was last processed. Details of other retention periods are available in the Record Retention (M 215) procedure available from the practice.
You have the following personal data rights:
The right to be informed
The right of access
The right to rectification
The right to erasure (clinical records must be retained for a certain time period)
The right to restrict processing
The right to data portability
The right to object
Further details of these rights can be seen in our Information Governance Procedures (M 217C) or at the Information Commissioner’s website. Here are some practical examples of your rights:
If you are a patient of the practice, you have the right to withdraw consent for important notifications, newsletters, surveys or marketing. You can inform us to correct errors in your personal details or withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text. You have the right to obtain a free copy of your patient records within one month.
If you are not a patient of the practice you have the right to withdraw consent for processing personal data, to have a free copy of it within one month, to correct errors in it or to ask us to delete it. You can also withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text.
We have carried out a Privacy Impact Assessment (M 217S) and you can request a copy from the details below. The details of how we ensure the security of personal data is in our Security Risk Assessment (M 217M) and Information Governance Procedures (M 217C).
Comments, suggestions and complaints
Please contact us by calling { !!$phone!! } or by writing to or visiting the practice at IM Smile, 116 Ocean Drive, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6JG. We take complaints very seriously.
If you are unhappy with our response or if you need any advice you should contact the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Their telephone number is 0303 123 1113, you can also chat online with an advisor. The ICO can investigate your claim and take action against anyone who’s misused personal data. You can also visit their website for information on how to make a data protection complaint.
Related practice procedures
You can also use these contact details to request copies of the following practice policies or procedures:
PRIVACY NOTICE FOR CHILDREN
The practice keeps records of your name, address, date of birth and details of any health problems as well as details of your dental treatment and details about your family. We keep this information so that we can provide you with the best dental care. Your personal information is kept very confidentially and securely.
We only use your personal information so we can give you the best dental care and for sending reminders to you.
We only pass your personal information to another dentist, doctor or hospital if you have a problem that needs their special skills and you need to go and see them. We will not give your information to anyone else unless the law allows us to or we have to provide it for legal reasons.
If you leave the practice, we will stop using your information but will keep it confidentially and securely until you are 25 years old, when we will review if and when we can delete it. You can always ask for a copy of the information we hold for you, we can transfer it to another dentist or doctor at your request and you can ask us to stop using your personal information to send letters or contact you in other ways if you are no longer a patient at the practice.
When you reach 18 years of age the Privacy Notice about how we process your personal information will change to the adult version. This can be found on our website.
If you would like a copy of the information we hold about you or if you have any other enquiries it about such as to change an error in your information or to provide a copy of your information to somebody else please contact us.
