The NHS Digital SMSP is an interface that lets health and care providers find important patient information on Spine. It's free and fully supported by NHS Digital.
The service currently makes demographic information available. Users can:
- check that an NHS number exists, using other demographic details
- search for patient demographic information based on a combination of NHS number, name, date of birth, postcode and gender
Using the SMSP is a simple and free way for health and care organisations to fulfil their duties under the NHS Standard Contracts to use the NHS number as a 'consistent identifier'. This means every patient is identified properly across care settings.
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.
How the SMSP works
The NHS Digital SMSP provides a web service interface, as part of the Spine platform. A local SMSP client can then be set up which can query certain Spine services through this interface.
Release dates for SMSP
The service has been piloted by a number of suppliers since the beginning of the year and was released for wider use from 3 July 2017.
Use SMSP
If you are developing health and care systems, a health and care IT specialist, or responsible for IT in your health and care organisation, and you are interested in using SMSP, contact us via email on [email protected]. Read comprehensive guidance on the SMSP.