Care Reform (Scotland) Act 2025

1 Ministers to facilitate creation of records

(1) The Scottish Ministers must exercise their powers under this Part so that every person who receives health care or a social service in Scotland can have a digital integrated care record.

(2) The purpose of a digital care record is to—

(a) enable Scottish health and social care information to be shared securely and efficiently amongst providers of health care and social services so that people’s experiences of health care and social services are as safe and seamless as possible, and

(b) ensure that people are, so far as practicable and consistent with data protection legislation, able to access their own Scottish health and social care information in a format accessible to them and exercise control over it.

(3) For the avoidance of doubt—

(a) fulfilling the duty imposed by subsection (1) is not the only purpose for which the Scottish Ministers may exercise their powers under this Part,

(b) in order to fulfil that duty, the Scottish Ministers may also exercise other functions.

(4) In this section—

• “health care” means a service for or in connection with the prevention, diagnosis or treatment of illness,

• “illness” is to be construed in accordance with section 108(1) of the National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1978,

• “Scottish health and social care information” means information concerning, or connected with, the provision in Scotland of health care or a social service,

• “social service” has the same meaning as it has in Part 5 of the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010 (see section 46(2) of that Act).