National Care Records Service (NCRS)

NCRS is a service that allows health and social care professionals to access and update a range of patient and safeguarding information across regional Integrated Care Services (ICS) boundaries.

The service provides a summary of health and care information for care settings where the full patient record is not required to support their direct care. The service is a web-based application and can be accessed regardless of what IT system an organisation is using and is the improved successor to the Summary Care Record application (SCRa).

Whilst the look and display of information on screen may feel different to that of SCRa, users should be aware that all existing information that was available in the legacy SCRa product remains available in NCRS. NCRS offers additional services that were not available in SCRa. See the roadmap for details.

The NCRS provides access to over 63 million patient records.

It enables any authorised clinician, care worker and/or administrator, in any health or care setting, to access a patient’s information to support that patient’s direct care. 

Helpful information about switching over from SCRa to NCRS is provided in the National Care Records Service (NCRS) user guidance. 

As a user, if feel that something is missing from NCRS, please contact [email protected] to tell us about it.

NCRS provides access to an ever-increasing number of centrally provisioned national digital services that support the direct care of patients. 

The following services relate to NCRS:

• Personal Demographics Service (PDS) - including the ability to edit patient demographic information
• Birth Notification process
• Summary Care Records (SCR) - core and Additional Information 
• National Record Locator Service (NRL) – pointers to and retrieval of data held in local provider systems 
• Child Protection - Information Sharing service (CP-IS)
• Reasonable Adjustment(s)
• Female Genital Mutilation - Information Sharing (FGM IS) 
• Overseas Visitors and Migrants (OVM)
• Coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination event information

It includes access to more than 57.5 million Summary Care Records with patient additional information. It also enables users to view over 450,000 care plan records via the National Record Locator.  

You can look up NHS patient numbers through the Personal Demographics Service, reasonable adjustment(s) (where flagged) and the Child Protection - Information Sharing service. Improved access to patient information supports the provision of safer care. 

It enables any authorised clinician, care worker and/or administrator, in any health or care setting, to access a patient’s information to support that patient’s direct care. 

NCRS should be used: 

• where access to a summary of key patient information is required to support clinical decision making where full detailed patient records are not required 
• to compliment local shared records by giving access to key patient information across ICS boundaries 
• where a local shared care record is not available currently 

The strategic intention for NCRS was set out in the Department for Health and Social Care policy ‘Plan for digital health and care’.

It is part of the work to build core national ‘connect’ capabilities, to enable authorised health and care professionals to have a holistic experience of the health and care system no matter where they happen to be in England.

It’s available using mobile or desktop devices connected to the internet using WiFi, mobile data or an existing Health and Social Care Network (HSCN) connection.

NCRS offers multiple access options including biometric authentication, smartcards and multifactor authentiction. Its predecessor, SCRa, is only available using a desktop computer, with Smartcard authentication and an HSCN connection. 

User authentication is provided by NHS Care Identity Service 2 (NHS CIS2), the products and services require NHS Credential Management to authenticate in secure modern browsers. 

This service is live.

NCRS is a gold service, meaning it will be available and supported 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Refer to the Service Management page for details on live service status statistics. 

The National Care Records Service is available now. The list of current services is listed below. 

To use NCRS, a user requires an NHS Care Identity Service authenticator, which can include existing smartcards, and a relevant role for authentication. 

Helpful information about switching over from SCRa to NCRS is provided in the National Care Records Service (NCRS) user guidance. 

Connection requirements

To access NCRS, you will need: 

• access to the internet or a Health and Social Care Network (HSCN) connection 
• to ensure your organisation has completed a Data Security and Protection Toolkit (DSPT) self-assessment and or reviewed the latest updates to it. (DSPT - formerly known as the Information Governance Toolkit).     
• local technical configuration including Identity Agent and NHS Credential Management as per Warranted Environment Specification on all user PCs 
• an assigned privacy officer for alert and audit purposes when viewing SCR 
• agreed local processes to ensure robust governance - when viewing SCR you will need to follow the Permission to View guidelines 
• a valid use case to access the Personal Demographics Service and for new organisations, you will require Demographics approval 
• to have prepared training for users covering the features your organisation plans to use 

NCRS uses a standalone portal. It can, therefore, be accessed regardless of what IT system an organisation is using.

NCRS can also be integrated directly into a local record system accessible via an in-context link. The summary information it provides may be useful in care settings when more detailed patient information is not required to support direct patient care. 

For organisations where mature Shared Care Record solutions are in place

Local systems will look to those to meet their detailed requirements for access to record and care plans. Initially these will be based around Integrated Care Board (ICB) footprints, or ICB collaborations. When national interoperability between local solutions is implemented, front line professionals will be able to access the detailed records and plans of the people they care for, regardless of where they live. 

The NCRS gives access now to a range of key patient information across regional boundaries to complement the local detailed Shared Care Records solutions.

For those less digitally mature and/or in the early stages of Shared Care Records planning

The NCRS is available now. It can be quickly onboarded to and deployed across multiple care settings. It provides safe secure access to national clinical patient information which may not be available by other means within the area. It is free to use and can be accessed regardless of what IT system the organisation is using .

The following table shows how to contact us about this service.