e-Referral services

What is e-referral service?

e-Referral Service is a national digital platform used to refer patients from primary care into elective care services. e-Referral Service allows patients to choose their first outpatient hospital or clinic appointment and book it in the national health system and patient portal, online or on the phone.

e-Referral services are the link and interface between health care providers in a primary and specialty care settings. E-Referral process is defined as transferring of responsibility of patient care from referring provider to another physician or provider like hospital or physicians, so that it also includes the transfer back of patient care in an appropriate time.

e-Referral services have been designed to improve wait times and efficiency by electronically standardizing information and communication within the referral process.

There is a deep-rooted impression in many countries that higher levels of health services provide the best care. It is essential to make link between health service levels in order to assurance people that they will access specialized services if it is truly needed.

Some e-Referral services in countries

• Electronic Referrals in Finland
• The MedCom-Projects in Denmark
• National Health Service (NHS) and the “Choose and Book” System, United Kingdom
• ZorgDomein, Netherland
• Electronic Referrals in Norway

Some benefits of e-Referral services

1. e-Referral services will improve patient outcomes, user experiences and support the drive to a future paperless national health system and central national health system.
2. e-Referral services will build upon the benefits and successes of the choose and book system, acknowledging its failures (both real and perceived) and lessons learned.
3. There will no longer be a mixed economy of paper and electronic referrals.
4. The needs of patients and professionals will be foremost in designing the new services, which will include support for enhanced functionality and usability.

Some functionalities of e-Referral services

• Follow-up appointments: Patients able to choose and book their own follow-up appointments electronically along with alert/reminder advising them when to book.
• Self-Referrals: Commissioning organizations able to determine services that are appropriate to accept self-referrals from patients. Patients able to refer themselves into services.
• Reporting: A rich reporting function that provides easy access to referral and booking data in meaningful formats.
• Electronic communication: Use of modern technology – mobile phone Apps, e-mails, text reminders etc, to support different ways of communicating appointment-related information to patients and system alerts to professional users.
• Integration and Usability: A more intuitive system with a modern look and feel that will support the seamless transfer of referral information from GP clinical systems into provider systems.
• Referral management support: Enhanced Advice and Guidance functionality and Clinical Request Templates supporting clinical decisions. Commissioners driven Referral Assessment Services.
• Any to Any: Consultants able to make tertiary and onward referrals and commissioners being able to assign referrer rights to groups of clinicians and practitioners.
• Linked Appointments: Ability to link appointments in a care pathway to ensure all take place in a pre-determined order.

Maryam Ghalandari