This story was first published in digitalhealth.net
Google allowed access to NHS patient records
The New Scientist has revealed that a data sharing agreement has allowed Google to be given access to an estimated 1.6 million NHS patients records.
Google has confirmed it will use the data to develop an early warning system of patients at risk of developing acute kidney injuries (AKI) . The agreement will see Google’s artificial intelligence devision, DeepMind, access the data of patients from the Royal Free, Barnet and Chase Farm hospitals in London from 2011 and continuing to 2017.
The company plans to use the data to develop a Streams app which will alert doctors when someone is at risk of developing AKI. NHS data has shown that AKI is a contributing factor in up to 20 per cent of emergency hospital admissions, where 25 per cent of such cases are preventable.
However, critics have raised concerns about why the scheme needs the data of all patients to create such a specific app. According to the Royal Free Trust the data will remain encrypted so Google employees will not be able to identify anyone.
In a statement, Royal Free said: "Our arrangement with DeepMind is the standard NHS information-sharing agreement set out by NHS England's corporate information governance department, and is the same as the other 1,500 agreements with third-party organisations that process NHS patient data.
"As with all information sharing agreements with non-NHS organisations, patients can opt out of any data-sharing system by contacting the trust's data protection officer."
Dominic King, a senior scientist at Google DeepMind, said: "Access to timely and relevant clinical data is essential for doctors and nurses looking for signs of patient deterioration. This work focuses on acute kidney injuries that contribute to 40,000 deaths a year in the UK, many of which are preventable.
"The kidney specialists who have led this work are confident that the alerts our system generates will transform outcomes for their patients. For us to generate these alerts it is necessary for us to look at a range of tests taken at different time intervals."
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