How do we know if a patient has opted out of SMS/ calls communications from PDS API?
PDS does not hold information about opting out of SMS/Telephone communications at a national level.
However, there are some contact preferences that can be used, with some caveats. See the schema on Personal Demographics Service - FHIR API - NHS England Digital and some narrative on Get and update contact details in PDS - NHS England Digital about the telecoms values themselves
in the PDS API there is only a PreferredContactMethod field with these possible values:
- 1 - Letter
- 2 - Visit
- 3 - Telephone
- 4 - E-mail
- 5 - Minicom (Textphone)
- 6 - Telephone contact via proxy
- 7 - Sign language
- 8 - No Telephone contact
What does the option 8 imply here?
PDS does not hold the concept of opt out. if the data point is in PDS, then it can be used. Also preferences are not required to use a contact detail in PDS for direct care. any contact detail in PDS can be used. Any contact detail gathered directly from the patient via say the NHS App or when registering with a GP informs this, but it is already an expectation from the patient that in giving the NHS the data, they are allowing it to be used.
User research has also consistently shown that patients expect the sender to use the most appropriate channel to communicate with the patient even if in a local form they have ticked a box for a preference.
hope this is useful, but happy to talk if you have any questions