How can Nalytics help GP practices, hospitals and NHS Trusts?

This is a promotional article for Nalytics software developed by Nalanda Technology.

Since General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into effect, anyone can request access to recorded information held by a public authority through Freedom of Information (FOI) requests and Subject Access Requests (SARs).

While FOI requests give members of the public the right to access any recorded information held by a public authority, SARS give individuals the right to access and receive a copy of their personal data.

The right covers all recorded information, including that held on computers, in emails and in printed or handwritten documents, as well as images, videos and audio recordings. Responding to both requests can therefore be a time-consuming and costly procedure, as they are normally performed manually.

Whilst there are numerous software tools available to help you respond to search requests, most of these are designed for use by IT staff and are often difficult to use for less technical users. Nalytics offers a solution to this problem.

What is Nalytics?

Developed by Nalanda Technology, Nalytics is a powerful search and discovery tool which uses the power of AI (artificial intelligence) to search across all documents and files.

Using the three core pillars – search, discover and analyse – Nalytics takes care of tedious and repetitive work associated with a variety of everyday admin tasks, such as document comparison, redaction and date recognition.

Its unique approach lies in its understanding of the hierarchical structure of documents. Where most search tools use a ‘shotgun’ approach to find documents containing specific words, Nalytics uses the document’s structure, or its digital DNA, to provide precise and relevant results.

For example, if you searched for the term “high blood pressure” in a simplistic search tool, it would bring up all documents which contain the words “high”, “blood” and “pressure”, whether they are relevant to the search term or not.

However, Nalytics can locate the exact sentences in each document in which all of the search terms occur. As with the above example, it could locate the sentence: “the initial blood pressure reading was high”, ensuring you discover all relevant terms in every context.

How is Nalytics different from other search and discovery tools and why is it useful?

Nalytics software is easy-to-use, enabling all users to quickly locate personally identifiable information (PII) and other personal data, supporting organisations in GDPR compliance and the fulfilment of SARs and FOI requests.

The software can scan and analyse a range of sources, including PDFs, TXT files, Word documents, spread sheets and email archives, without the needed to convert any of them to PDF first. It can even analyse scanned handwritten documents, so you don’t have to spend hours sifting through mountains of paperwork.

If there is any confidential, personal or commercially sensitive information found during the search, the software will automatically redact such information every time it occurs, helping to mitigate data breaches. Rest assured that you have complete control and final oversight of the document to ensure all confidential information is omitted.

Since Nalytics is a cloud-based platform, you can access the software from anywhere in the world and from any device, meaning there is no need for costly on-premise installation. It is also highly scalable, supporting additional users and content without the need for any major infrastructural changes or development work.

How could Nalytics help GP practices, hospitals and NHS trusts?

Since 2018, individuals have a right to apply for access to health records irrespective of when they were compiled. This means anyone can request to view a copy of their health records, or their relative’s health records (if they have permission to do so), at any time.

NHS Trusts can receive thousands of SARs every year and since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, this number has only increased. As these requests must be completed within one month to comply with GDPR regulations, this has put added strain on practices and Trusts which are already under a huge amount of pressure.

Using Nalytics, SARs that would normally take days to complete can be completed within just a few hours, allowing organisations to easily meet their response deadline.

The number of unstructured documents within a computer system is usually the biggest challenge facing organisations, as the pertinent data they contain can be anywhere within the pages of free text. With the Nalytics search function, you can quickly and easily search across all structured and unstructured documents, files and emails to find all the information held about an individual.

To ensure that you discover all the relevant information held on an individual, Nalytics allows you to alter how the subject’s name appears, for example, Joe Bloggs could be: Mr Bloggs; J Bloggs; joe bloggs; j bloggs; bloggs j; etc. Or, there may only be a medical reference number rather than a name, which you can also search for.

Emails about patients with an attached file can be forwarded on to many people for consultation, resulting in dozens of copies of the attachment and original email text. Normally, these are all presented as potential data records for your collection of SAR suspect documents. However, Nalytics can quickly search for duplicate files, saving you the hassle of having to deal with each document separately.

As previously mentioned, Nalytics can also automatically redact any sensitive information or third party PII which should not be disclosed, ensuring that no data breaches occur. If any confidential details are disclosed to your client, your organisation could face a substantial fine, as seen with one GP Practice in Hertfordshire which was fined £40,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for disclosing a woman’s confidential details to her ex-husband.

Redacting images can also raise issues, particularly when it comes to obscuring signatures, protecting children’s identities, and hiding medical scans. Nalytics provides users with expandable shapes with rotate and colour options, which can help to hide the fact that redaction has been applied.

Nalytics can therefore help to prevent your organisation from coming under strain by streamlining your SAR response process, reducing the time you spend on researching, redacting, reporting and responding to SARs and FOI requests, ultimately helping you to save money, improve the quality and speed of GDPR compliance, which all helps to boost staff morale.

This is a promotional article written following a free trial provided by Nalanda Technology.

To find out more about Nalytics head to Nalytics.com where you can book a demonstration.