Spine Mini Service Provider for Personal Demographics Service

The first NHS Digital SMSP application has been developed for the Personal Demographics Service (PDS), one of the core Spine services. The PDS is the national database of patient demographic information, comprising patients’ NHS Number, basic demographic details (name, DOB, gender, address), contact details, registered GP practice, pharmacy preferences for use in EPS, and various indicators for records management purposes.

The SMSP for PDS makes national demographic information available to suitable organisations with NHS Digital has a legal basis for sharing PDS Data. It allows these organisations to fulfil their duties under the NHS standard contracts to use the NHS number as a ‘consistent identifier’, resulting in every patient being identified properly across care settings.  It will also improve ease of access to national information by social care organisations.  The service provides access to demographic data so that end users can:

• Determine the NHS number using other demographic details.
• Search for patient demographic information based on a combination of NHS number, name, date of birth, postcode and gender.

In the future we may develop the SMSP to let users connect with other Spine services, such as Summary Care Records or the Electronic Prescription Service.

The information and resources are available in the following sections:  

• Overview of SMSP for PDS and its capabilities, the connection and compliance processes
• The NHS Digital self-certified approach, involving completion of the Target Operating Model (TOM) document, along with two example development scenarios that describe how to complete the TOM
• How to request access to PDS via SMSP. This is the first step for interested organisations, either Supplier or End User
• Stage 1: Getting Started including quickstart for developers
• Stage 2: Access to Personal Demographics Service
  • Describes the NHS Digital scrutiny process that establishes whether the purpose for which the data is required represents a legal basis for NHS Digital sharing that data with the organisation
  • Covers the completion of Phase 1a of the TOM (Usage and settings approval)
• Stage 3: Development (for Suppliers)
  • Requirements and resources to support development of a compliant Client and completion of Phase 1b of the TOM (Technical Conformance approval), including a Cheat Sheet and reference implementation
• Stage 4: Test and Assurance
  • Requirements and resources to complete local and integration testing and submit evidence to NHS Digital
  • Covers the completion of Phase 1b (Technical Conformance approval) and Phase 2 (End User Organisation approval) of the TOM
• Stage 5: Agreements
  • Approvals checklists, the Connection Agreement, End User Organisation Policy and Special Terms
• Stage 6: Deployment and Service Management
  • Endpoint registration and live deployment procedures plus an overview of live service management