Thousands of health practitioners - and more than 100 medical students - will have controlled access to the shared medical records of southern patients from today.
The aim of HealthOne is to ensure hospital and community-based health services work together. Shared information includes GP records, test results and prescriptions.
Patients are able to opt out, but if they do not, their information will be included by default.
Groups with access include clinical administration workers (570), doctors (750), nurses (1870), other health professionals (580), students (120), and participating pharmacies.
Sixty-one out of 81 GP practices had signed up.
Southern District Health Board chief medical officer Nigel Millar said advanced medical students had access because they saw patients as part of their training.
Neither ACC nor the police could access the system, he confirmed.
Asked if staff could access records from their homes, Dr Millar said some were authorised to do so through a secure system.
The information was held in a high-security data centre in Christchurch, managed by Canterbury District Health Board.
``All access to patient records is monitored and stored in an audit log. This is continuously reviewed and unusual access is flagged and reviewed.
``Registered health professionals are very well aware of their requirements as to patient privacy and that they place their registration and career at risk if they misuse clinical information systems,'' Dr Millar said.
The programme was launched in hospitals only in July.
Mornington Pharmacy owner Keith Newton said HealthOne would allow him to access information that was often missing from prescriptions.
At present, pharmacists had to ring Dunedin Hospital to try to get hold of particular doctors when part of a prescription was unclear, and the need for that would be reduced.
