NHS Medical records issues
 

So I have my class 1 initial today at Heathrow Medical Services and after a few weeks of pushing only got my GP records yesterday.

Looking through my GP notes they have been combined with someone else who lives in Birmingham who has a different first and middle name, same surname spelt differently and same date of birth.

My records are incomplete and his history is interspersed with mine.

A couple of questions:

1: Anyone else had this issue?
2: How will it affect my class 1 today?

Why you taking your NHS GP records??.

I have had an issue with sleep apnoea that is now resolved but needed to put it on the form.

I've just spoken to the AME and my Class 1 will be referred to the CAA and he said the records need to be correct and complete to stop the referral being held up.

I have a similar discrepancy with my records, discovered a few years ago at my local GP's surgery when I needed to check which inoculations might need topping up for foreign travel.

Although they have my records on their database, they seem to think that they are all overdue - since 1957!

Several different issues here!

I would be very concerned if another person's records were mixed with mine. How do you know your records are not mixed with someone elses.....This is extremely serious and could result in a massive fine under GDPR and repercussions from both the GMC and CQC. You should immediately inform the practice in writing and demand the issue be corrected. It is also dangerous because your GP might withhold treatment or prescribe the wrong treatment or give a consultant inaccurate information which could be harmful in future. The same applies to the other patient - say he is allergic to penicillin but the entry is in your notes and not his......wow

As to

then clearly your records dont meet this requirement, but it doesnt make sense - medical records will be taken at face value by the CAA and as we have seen on this board many times, an injudicious entry is difficult to reverse. Taking them to your medical doesnt ensure they are correct or complete, but does allow the AME to have a good read which isnt in your interest.

I really dont think you should take your records as they are. You do of course have the right to see your 'corrected' records at no cost before they are sent to the CAA in future but I very much doubt a GP's entries about OSA will make a difference. If you have had a sleep study then the result will be required.

Thanks for your great response.

To update, I've just come out of the GP who have mucked this up.

They're going to go back and correct all this and seemed as incredulous as I am. My records appear to have been mixed when i joined this GP and shes going to go back to my old GP to figure out how this happened.

My major concern is that my 15month old daughters details may be mixed into this as her records are linked to mine, so the practice manager will investigate any release of my daughters information with this.

Basically a cock up all around.

As for the AME, that's the advice he gave. He wasn't interested in the records himself, just that I have them available and straight if the CAA ask for them for the apnoea.

He did also say that they would want the raw data from the sleep study and so I'm going back to the hospital that did it to get that.

After this I will be regularly checking my records for the NHS....

I recently moved cities so had to change my GP to a practise a bit closer to home. Took weeks to transfer practises, but eventually got it done.

Requested my medical records a few weeks after this as I was heading abroad and needed to find out what I was vaccinated against, and expiry dates of these vaccinations...

... only to be told I had no vaccinations on record, and infact, nothing on my medical record at all except a few notes from my birth many moons ago! Contacted my now old GP surgery to request their notes, who advised me they'd been transferred to my new GP and all their copies had been destroyed... To and from for a number of weeks, and nobody knows where my records are, or if any exist! So for the time being, I'm just a ghost with no medical records at all :confused:

This is a very interesting topic. I've just renewed my EASA medical with my usual AME and we were both surprised - he's known me for a long time - that my CAA record stated my eye colour as blue and hair grey. My eyes are green and I have brown hair. I've only had one medical done by another AME (because I also needed an initial FAA medical at the time); the FAA cert correctly shows both eye and hair colour so I think it unlikely that the second AME entered the new, incorrect data on the CAA system. Very odd. I'm off to my GP on Monday to get a look at what they hold, just in case.

The AME has been excellent, my feeling is that he is guiding me in the right direction to get the result I want which is a Class 1 Medical as quickly as possible. So his advice has been all along to only declare what's necessary, but have the records straight and available should the CAA require them to make a decision, which for the OSA he said they will want the raw data from the sleep study.

The GP surgery on the other hand I no longer trust, and having read the other guys notes there are some very serious markers on my record now which I won't go into on this thread.

That's poor, the problem is that as Radgirl mentioned above - these notes are important and inform future treatment.

Hope you get it all sorted.

Did you head home and double check your eye colour?:}

The NHS is a mess. I thought we spend 15billion on a computer system to ensure this stuff didn't happen!

After this debacle, I would now recommend that everyone regularly check their records.

As for me, my next step is that I am speaking to a solicitor as I don't trust the GP to ensure that there are no markers with other public bodies based on this guys medical notes.

I will keep all updated, and anymore stories like this would be great to hear. I'm interested to know how common this is.

I have just spent a week in hospital having a tumour removed and during a quiet period examined my notes at the bottom of the bed. The folder had only been partially completed and numerous details were missing. I compare this document to a tech log and, if this had been the aviation industry, there would have been in serious trouble.

I was told on numerous occasions to ask if I wanted extra pain relief, which I did, and nothing happened. I was supposed to have 2 anaesthetic injections per day and rarely got more than one...sometimes at midnight...sometimes none at all.

On discharge day the Surgeon said I could go, another doctor said I needed to stay in overnight for a 10 hour Potassium slow drip top up.

The final straw came on the last day when the Consultant told me not to take any more Aspirin as I was to go on a self administered injection. The nurse who was doing the medication rounds was still standing there and had literally given me aspirin one minute before.

To me the NHS suffers from a complete lack of communication and dreadful record keeping. Nothing I read here surprises me at all.

I have just renewed my medical and the AME got my eye colour, hair colour, height (and by association, BMI), all wrong.

I challenged each error and was over-ruled.

I also put down my employer on the CAA form every year, and even so, they still had me working for a company that went bust over ten years ago.

One year I was also 2" shorter than every other year; another year the AME weighed me as 1/2 stone more than I was. When I challenged this, I was reprimanded, and told his scales were calibrated and accurate. When we went to use a second set to prove he was right, it showed his scales did over-read by 1/2 stone. He had been using these scales, one presumes, for all his medicals.

I can see how 'mistakes' happen ............

I agree, imagine an engineer doing their job to the same standards. They would be sacked.

I think there is too much defense of the NHS and not enough pragmatism.

Good luck with your recovery. I hope all goes well for you going forward.

This is pretty poor. I find it funny that we as laymen get reprimanded for challenging the most obvious mistakes, whilst being at risk for prosecution for failing to declare minor medical issues.

There is a definite trust issue here and the authorities are making it difficult to trust their ability to get simple things right, let alone complex issues.

This is why we have issues with people hiding things.

You cannot condone anyone hiding a medical condition (and I know that is not what you are saying), but I do take your point.

I've just waited a month to get the results of a NHS scan, and when I complained to me GP surgery, they chased it up with the hospital. The hospital stated that they forgot I had the scan - even though they sent me for it themselves, so no one has even looked at the results.

I had to make a Data Access request to even see the results, which showed a tumour that has now grown 25% in the last four months.

Are these mistakes, lack of oversight, or pure negligence?


(Not that any of these people care, but all the above is stopping me going back to work - and that's before I am even told of I need my head cut open!)

I'm so sorry that this has happened to you.

I am lucky that my health hasn't been put at risk by my GP, I can't imagine the stress this has put you under.

Have you got access to private healthcare? If so I suggest going down that route as soon as possible.

This thread has certainly opened a can of worms!

The NHS as it stands is simply not fit for purpose, and instead of addressing the shortcomings and fixing problems everyone seems to be burying their head in the sand and bleating about it being the best healthcare system in the world.

I hope you recover from this and have the support you need.

A simple fall back is to ask for a copy of everything as you go along. Every time you see a consultant ask for a copy of his letter to the GP and a photocopy of his notes. Every time you have a blood test ask for a copy of the results. Every time you have any imaging, the CD and report etc etc. Nobody can refuse these requests and in practice, apart possibly for the photocopied notes, they will not charge provided you ask at the time

The NHS is well behind on IT and is going down the road of importing massive systems from other countries that are mindbogglingly expensive and complex such that they are not solving the basic requirements for all an individual's notes to be in one place and immediately accessible.