April 2020

Vulnerable Patients (Scotland)

As extensively reported, NHS Scotland will be writing to your ‘most vulnerable’ patients advising them to stay indoors for the next 12 weeks.

As directed by NHS Scotland, we have run a utility on your patient records and any patients falling in the ‘at risk’ group as specified by NHS Scotland now have clinical term 9d44.00 Risk of exposure to communicable disease (situation) added to their record.

By default the associated History entry will have:

  • Read Term for Characteristic - 9d44.00 Potential infectious contact - note the SNOMED CT Description is used for the terms automatically added to patient records.
  • Comment - High risk category for developing complications from Covid-19 - Added at NSS request.
  • Priority – 1, meaning it is included in Emergency Care Summary (ECS) and Key Information Summary uploads

If you have any patients in this vulnerable category that have not been identified with the term 9d44.00 for any reason, for example, newly registered patients, patients with new at risk diagnoses or patients prescribed drugs by a hospital, Read term 9d44.00 Potential infectious contact must be manually added to their clinical record with a Priority of 1 and High risk category for developing complications from Covid-19 entered into Comments.

Viewing your Coronavirus/Covid-19 ‘Most Vulnerable’ Patients

You can view the patients who have had the 9d44.00 clinical term added to their record by downloading and importing the latest Coronavirus Clinical Audit from here http://help.visionhealth.co.uk/clinical%20audit/Content/Downloads/INPS%20Daily.htm and reviewing the Patients flagged by NHS Scotland as increased risk for developing complications from Covid-19 infection (9d44) group:

The group has an active Reminder of ‘At significant increased risk from COVID-19’.

See Downloading and Importing Clinical Audits for details on downloading and importing Clinical Audits.