Your responsibilities

Our ‘Care and treatment: your rights and choices’ information explains your rights and choices with regard to your epilepsy care and treatment. ‘Rights’ are in the NHS Constitution and the Handbook to the NHS Constitution, and you are entitled to them by law. Where we say ‘you should’, you may not have a legal right, but these are recommendations made in the NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) guideline on epilepsy.

You have responsibilities as well as rights

Along with your rights to services from the NHS, you have some responsibilities to the NHS too. These include the following:

• “please recognise that you can make a significant contribution to your own, and your family’s, good health and wellbeing, and take personal responsibility for it;
• please register with a GP practice – the main point of access to NHS care as commissioned by NHS bodies;
• please treat NHS staff and other patients with respect and recognise that violence or the causing of nuisance of disturbance on NHS premises could result in prosecution;
• please provide accurate information about your health, condition and status;
• please keep appointments, or cancel within reasonable time. Receiving treatment within the maximum waiting times may be compromised unless you do;
• please follow the course of treatment which you have agreed, and talk to your clinician if you find this difficult; 
• please participate in important public health programmes such as vaccinations;
• please ensure that those closest to you are aware of your wishes about organ donation; and
• please give feedback – both positive and negative – about your experiences and the treatment and care you have received, including any adverse reactions you may have had”. Handbook to the NHS Constitution 
   

For more about the NHS Constitution visit nhs.uk/NHSConstitution 
For more about the Handbook to the NHS Constitution visit gov.uk/government/publications/supplements-to-the-nhs-constitution-for-england
For more about the NICE guideline visit nice.org.uk/guidance/ng217

Information updated: March 2023