Employment law SOS: Sharing medical reports with employees

If you want a medical report from the employee's GP or specialist, or anyone else who has 'treated' the employee, then the Access to Medical Reports Act (AMRA) applies. AMRA gives the employee the right to see the medical report before it is sent to you. If you want a report from an occupational health (OH) specialist then, unless they have already treated the employee, AMRA will not apply. However, 'treated' has a wide definition: it covers an examination, investigation or diagnosis in connection with any form of medical treatment. This means that your OH specialist will often be covered by AMRA. In any case, in our experience, OH specialists tend to offer the employee the chance to see their report before it is sent to you, because of the uncertainty over when AMRA applies and their general ethical obligations. If you do not want the employee to see the report first, you could seek a report from an independent expert medical consultant. However, remember that: - the employee will know you have the report and can get hold of it by making a data subject access request - if you base any management decision on the report, how will you explain it to the employee without sharing the report? - in some cases, not sharing the report might result in a constructive and/or unfair dismissal claim – for example if you withhold sick pay or try to dismiss the employee but won't reveal the medical basis for this. So you should be prepared to share the report. Also, take care over what you say in your instructions to the doctor – as the employee will generally end up seeing those, too.