Depending on what sort of data you process and for what purpose, you might be required to appoint an independent expert in data protection known as a Data Protection Officer (DPO) for your organisation.

DPOs must be appointed based on their professional qualities and expert knowledge of data protection law and practices, so often this can present a challenge to smaller organisations.

Your named DPO is not only required to have extensive knowledge in the specialist field of data protection, but also needs to effectively liaise with the Information Commissioner’s Office, investigate reported breaches and provide detailed and expert guidance on what can and cannot be achieved within the boundaries of key legislation. Crucially, this support and guidance can prevent financial penalties being imposed on organisations, should breaches occur.

The NHS Midlands and Lancashire (ML) DPO service can provide all this for your organisation, ensuring you meet your statutory obligations by having a named DPO, and taking on board all the other duties that a DPO is expected to undertake. These duties can be varied and time consuming, not only when breaches occur, but throughout the whole year. Our DPO service will ensure that your organisation and your staff are not only compliant with your information governance (IG) legal requirements but also have the security of knowing they have an IG and data protection expert on hand when needed.

Our model of delivery means that we provide a named DPO who will build a relationship with your organisation to understand your needs, objectives and challenges, and is supported by a team of IG specialists who will ensure that all DPO queries are managed efficiently and effectively.

NHS ML’s DPO service brings added value as, alongside our expertise gained from being part of the NHS, we have knowledge and experience of other projects, initiatives, system implementations and data sharing agreements that have been supported in other areas. This allows us to apply lessons that have been learned from the experience of other systems and to ensure the best utilisation of time and resource, avoiding duplication where we can.

Having the ability to deal with often complex queries and provide advice and guidance in a clear and easy-to-understand manner is crucial to the development of strong working relationships between organisations and their DPO. 

Organisations need confidence and trust in the expertise and knowledge supplied by their DPO. Information needs to be cascaded to them in a clear and easy to understand manner without jargon and the technical language contained within the legislation – and this is what our DPO service provides.

Contact us for more information at mlcsu.ig@nhs.net or 01782 916 875.