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GP patient data to be made available for research on an opt-in basis

Harry Hetherington
12 February 2026

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The Data Specification identifies, as being in scope, all patients currently registered with a GP or with a date of death on or after 1 November 2019 whose record contains certain coded information. For each patient, the following data will be collected:

• NHS Number
• Postcode
• Address
• Surname and forename
• Sex
• Ethnicity
• Date of birth
• Date of death.
Data will be collected for the associated SNOMED code(s) and date(s) for GP record entries
including:
• Diagnoses and findings
• Medications and other prescribed items
• Investigations, tests and results
• Treatments and outcomes
• Vaccinations and immunisations.

However, Type 1 Objections are applied to data prior to collection by NHS England and those records are excluded from the Data Specification. Therefore, the data for those participants who have registered a Type 1 Objection with their GP will not be collected and will not be available to share with an Approved Research Study, even if explicit consent has been provided by or on behalf of those participants, for so long as a Type 1 Objection is in place.

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