Information sharing with the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) guidance for health and care professionals

You may receive a request from DWP to produce a report about one of your patients to allow DWP to assess a claim for a social security benefit or other welfare payment.

There are different circumstances where DWP might request information. It might be requested when:

• a person first makes a claim to benefits or welfare payment
• there is a change in the circumstances of a person already in receipt of benefits or welfare payment
• a person’s entitlement to a benefit (or welfare payment) is time limited and needs to be renewed

As part of the application process for a claim, DWP will obtain the explicit consent of the applicant for DWP to request and receive information about their health from their GP, hospital consultant or other health or care professional.

DWP will not ask organisations for a report on a person’s health or care unless they have obtained this explicit consent from the individual.

If DWP's report asks for information which a patient has specifically asked you not to share, the patient’s request should be respected, and it is acceptable to write ’cannot be disclosed’. However, you should flag to the patient that this could affect their eligibility for benefits. You should advise the patient to speak to DWP directly if they have any concerns about this.

Typically, DWP reports are addressed to the patient’s GP or hospital consultant named in the claim form, and they would be expected to oversee the completion of the report.

GPs can delegate the completion of a report to another relevant healthcare professional within the practice, such as a practice nurse.

Hospital consultants can also delegate the report to a more junior doctor (such as a senior house officer, registrar, or other appropriate healthcare professional).

There are also certain specific DWP reports, such as the SR1 form for individuals who are nearing the end of their lives, which can be completed by a GP, a consultant, a specialty doctor, a hospice doctor or senior specialist nurse.

The appendix of DWP’s guidance on completing medical reports gives examples of the types of information that might be requested about your patient. Some examples are:

• their condition
• their symptoms
• the treatment they are receiving or have recently received, including recent hospital stays
• the impact on their day to day activities

The questions on the report require simple, factual responses which you have independently verified based on your knowledge of your patient and information contained in their health records.

If you do not know the answer to a question and the information is not in the patient’s health record, you are not expected to search further or carry out additional interventions with your patient to find out the answer. It is acceptable to write ‘not known’.

You should not include any information in reports which has not already been shared with patients. This is because they cannot consent to sharing information they are not aware of. Likewise, you should not share information about other people (third-party information), or information that the individual would not reasonably expect you to share.

You do not need to discuss the completion of the report with the patient or show it to them before sending it to DWP unless you think it would be beneficial to do so.

When submitting a report request, DWP will advise an appropriate timeframe for completion and return.