Training materials

This page is designed to guide you through the key training resources, ensuring you have all the information needed to use the Shared Care Record system effectively.

Most users will access the Shared Care Record via single sign-on. This means that you do not need additional login details and will only be able to view information about the person whose record you are currently accessing in your own IT system. If you have been contacted by your organisation about accessing the Shared Care Record via direct access (logging in using specific login details), please refer to the materials at the end of this page.

Getting started

Start with our short introductory “Getting you ready to go” video. This contains essential information and guidance from our clinical teams to prepare you to use the system.

Getting you ready to go video transcript

Welcome to this ready to go video which provides key information to help you get the most from the new MSE Shared Care Record, delivered by Orion Health.

A Shared Care Record is a system that brings essential data together from different organisations into one place. These systems are currently being introduced across England to allow professionals involved in a person’s care to securely share information. The purpose is to foster holistic and collaborative ways of working across care and treatment settings.

The level of access you will have depends on your role and is determined by your organisation.

You don’t need to obtain consent from the individual to access their information via the Shared Care Record. Under GDPR, we have the legal basis to share information between health and care organisations when delivering care for a person. This is all covered by our existing My Care Record information sharing agreement. Find out more on the My Care Record website.

You can access the Shared Care Record through your own IT system when you have an individual’s record loaded. This is called Single Sign On, meaning you do not need to enter any further login details. You will be taken to the Shared Care Record dashboard. From the dashboard you can access information under different tabs.

Please be aware that data is being introduced in phases. Following an initial rollout in July 2024, more organisations in Mid and South Essex will begin feeding data into the system, and benefit from accessing data from other organisations. In the next phase, during autumn 2024, adult social care data from local authorities will also be added. This will include information such as an adult’s package of care, their allocated social worker, and whether an assessment has been completed.

You can find out more information about what data is being made available in our data visibility guide. You can find this by clicking the ‘Understanding the data button in the portal.

The Shared Care Record is a read-only system. This means that you cannot send/receive messages through it, or input any data directly into the record. The data is pulled automatically from each organisation’s IT system. In some cases, this will be at different rates.

In the clinical document viewer tree, information is grouped by organisation and separated out under headings. This means that data, such as allergies and medications will be split and displayed separately under the unit where this data was recorded. Please also be aware that, although most data within the system will be updated within minutes, the data on the demographics page will only be updated once every 24 hours.

The Shared Care Record is designed to be simple and easy to use. To support you in using the system, we offer training and resources. If you need assistance with finding information or navigating the system, please watch our short training videos and refer to the quick reference guides. These can be found at www.midandsouthessex.ics.nhs.uk/sharedcarerecord under “More information for professionals”.

If you have any technical issues with the Shared Care Record you can raise a ticket with your local helpdesk for assistance.

The Shared Care Record allows us to see at a glance who else is involved in the care of our patients and residents. When health and social care professionals share information, we can visualise shared goals and we’re a step closer to more joined up and collaborative ways of working.

We’re excited by the opportunities that this will bring, and we hope you find the system helpful.

Please note: The system may look slightly different from what is shown in this training videos as more data is added. Core functionality remains the same.

Accessing the Shared Care Record

Single sign-on enables secure access to the Shared Care Record without needing separate login details. Below are guides tailored for each IT system showing how to load the Shared Care Record.

Using the Shared Care Record’s functionality

Person banner and person demographics

This instructional video explains how to identify individuals using the person banner, and how to access detailed personal information through the full demographics section.

Using the person banner and person demographics video transcript

Welcome to the Shared Care Record instructional video on person banner and full demographics.

To safely identify an individual, the banner will clearly show the person’s name, date of birth, age, gender and address, telephone numbers and email address in the top left-hand side of the screen as well as GP details. This information will only be shown if this is available from partners for this person.

The banner will also display the person’s NHS number on the top right-hand side of the screen.

The banner will also detail additional information under certain circumstances. For example, if the person is deceased, this will be indicated with a flag in front of the person’s name and the age at death will be shown.

If an individual has requested that their record be marked as sensitive on the Personal Demographic Service database, then the information displayed in the banner will be limited to name, NHS number, date of birth and gender. In this case, no contact or location details will be visible. Information about how to mark a record as sensitive on the Personal Demographic Service database can be found on NHS England’s website.

If you click on the banner, it will expand to reveal further information. If you select the More button underneath the person’s address for example, you will be presented with further demographic information and unique identifiers, such as medical record numbers from other clinical systems, or patient administration systems, known as PAS systems. To remove the further information, you can either use the escape button on your keyboard or select the cross button.

To collapse a banner, please click anywhere on it and it will reduce freeing up space on your screen. Please ensure that you click within the banner itself and not above or below as this will not collapse it. Underneath the banner bar on the left-hand menu, you will notice a section titled full patient demographics.

Selecting full demographics will present a screen that holds further personal information. It will present information that is held within the banner bar such as name, date of birth and gender but will also hold other information such as ethnicity, nationality, any languages that they may speak, interpreter requirements, religion, marital status, birthplace, overseas visitor status, any disabilities that may be recorded and whether the person lives alone.

There will also be additional information on addresses, home contact details, any aliases that exist, primary care providers, unique identifiers, emergency contact information displaying the name, relationship and contact numbers.

Please note: The system may look slightly different from what is shown in this training videos as more data is added. Core functionality remains the same.

Person summary and care network

The following materials cover the person summary and care network sections of the Shared Care Record. The person summary provides health and care professionals with a view that displays multiple self-contained cards containing information from various sources. It includes events, appointments, and documents, and offers features for filtering and viewing data efficiently. The care network provides key information about the people involved in a person’s care, including professional and personal contacts. Start with the video and refer to the accompanying quick reference guide.

Using the person summary video transcript

Welcome to the Shared Care Record instructional video on viewing the person summary.

When accessing a person’s record you will be taken to the person summary page. The person summary provides health and care professionals with a view that displays multiple self-contained cards that contain a variety of information from various sources across different care settings.

The dashboard cards seen on this screen will typically include events and appointments and documents. You will also notice an important clinical safety message to the left. Please ensure you read this. As we roll out the Shared Care Record, we expect to make more dashboard cards available.

If a card has no information to show, the card will still be present, but will have no information populated. You can refresh the screen using the reload dashboard icon.

You can hide information within the dashboard cards by selecting the collapse all icon. And similarly, you can expand all of the dashboard cards by selecting the expand all button.

You can choose to view your screen in either compact view or comfortable view.

You can adjust the dashboard card information by using the start and end date filters.

Accessing a document via the document’s dashboard card allows health and care professionals to see a chronological list of documents that exist for a person directly from the patient summary screen. It allows a user faster navigation to the document they wish to review without having to navigate through the searching options that exist in the clinical document viewer functionality.

Documents are immediately available from the patient summary screen to enable users to look at recent letters to quickly inform an urgent review. To return to the patient summary dashboard screen, click the person summary tab.

Each dashboard card can also be viewed in compact, comfortable or expanded view mode as shown. The comfortable view will always show the organisation that the data originated from by default.

The dashboard cards, such as all events and appointments, will arrange data according to the time of the event, such as if it’s in the future or in the past. It will also display icons against each row of data in a card to provide a visual indicator for the care setting the data originated from.

To view information relating to all events and appointments, select the expand arrow. Clicking on the numbers will show only the items associated with the respective event. You can expand individual elements of the dashboard cards by selecting the arrow next to the row you would like to view.

Please note: The system may look slightly different from what is shown in this training videos as more data is added. Core functionality remains the same.

  • Navigating the person summary screen – this guide explains how to access and navigate the person summary and care network screens, detailing the use of dashboard icons, view modes, and date range filters.

Clinical document viewer tree

The clinical document viewer tree allows you to navigate and access documents within a person’s record, structured by the organisation that shared the data. This section includes guides on how to view and manage documents and medications effectively.

Understand how to navigate and use the clinical document viewer tree with the following guides:

Launching the Cerner Health Information Exchange (HIE)

The Cerner HIE is another shared care record managed by Suffolk and North East Essex ICS. It can be used to view information about a person from neighbouring organisations outside of mid and south Essex.

For additional information about the data being shared by each organisation within Cerner HIE, please visit the Suffolk and North East Essex ICS website. For training materials to support your use of the Cerner HIE system, please visit the Hertfordshire and West Essex ICS website.

Get support

  • Get support – this guide explains how to view support routes and accessing key information and resources from within the Shared Care Record.

Direct access training

If you have specific login details for direct access, please refer to the following guides:

You can also use the following training videos: