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Upsetting medical history included in referral letter

Posted By Owl23

"Upsetting medical history included in referral letter"

About: Nethergreen Surgery

(as the patient),

I requested a letter from Nethergreen Surgery referring me to a private hospital for a consultation about varicose vein surgery. I received the letter but it included historical medical history that I did not request and did not find relevant.

The medical history included a historical traumatic event that I had never seen in writing before and, as I was not expecting to see it, it caused me some distress that I feel could have been avoided if it had not been sent to me or if, at the least, I had been warned that I would be receiving this information.

I also opened the letter in the presence of family members who do not know my medical history which added to my distress.

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Responses

Response from Nethergreen Surgery 3 years ago
Nethergreen Surgery

Submitted on 26/08/2020 at 15:21
Published on nhs.uk at 21:19

Thank you for taking time to provide feedback about your referral letter, and I am sorry that you found the contents upsetting.

We try to include the information the clinician feels most relevant information in any referral letter, and we often provide a summary attached to the letter, which is a brief synopsis of a patient’s medical record. This is ordinarily intended for the consultant’s use only, however I can appreciate it may be upsetting if some unexpected information was included.

If you would like to contact me at the Surgery with the specific details, I can look into this matter further, try to understand why this information was included, how it reached you and potentially remove it from future referrals. We can also look at our procedures and see if we need to change anything to stop this happening for other patients.

Again, please accept my apologies for the distress, it was not our intention for the referral letter to upset you.

Kind regards

Daniel Sayliss

Practice Manager

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