Burnham Health Centre

Referrals

Online access to your NHS referrals

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If you’ve been referred to a specialist through the NHS e-Referral Service, you can
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NHS referrals

Management of hospital appointments

Information on how to manage your NHS hospital appointment can be found under “How to change your appointment details, change or cancel your appointment, or cancel your referral” (outpatient local support) in Hospital which includes some local hospital contact details. GP practices do not have any control over the appointments system once they have done the referral, so you are always best contacting the hospital directly with any appointment issues. A summary of your two options with managing hospital appointments is found below.

NHS e-referral service
You can use the NHS e-Referral Service if you have received a letter saying you can use this system.
Find out more about using the e-Referral Service

Contact the hospital directly
You can book, cancel or change a hospital appointment by contacting a hospital directly by phone. Under Local Contact Details and Service Finder there are links to local hospital contact details. The websites in many cases include direct appointments numbers.

Other common NHS referral topics are covered below:

Contacting patient advice and liaison service
If you are unable to manage your appointment satisfactorily using the NHS e-referral service and contacting the hospital directly, then you can contact the PALS team associated with the hospital you have been referred to. Their contact details can be found under Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) and other support

Community services referrals (including to the physiotherapy team)
Once a referral has been completed by a GP practice (if a self-referral route is not available) then the organisation you have been referred to takes over full responsibility for this referral including any follow up appointments. If you have any issues including around delays in appointments or needing to change an appointment you should contact the organisation directly. There is further information including contact details for some of the common local community services under NHS community services (Adults) and NHS Community services (Children).

Under the section “Local hospital waiting times for various specialties” in Local and National Health News you can find outpatient waiting times at your local hospitals.

If you require more prolonged treatment (such as surgery) remember if you do choose a hospital further away than your local hospital that if you decide to switch back to your local hospital this is not a quick process and can disrupt your treatment.

Early diagnosis of a disease may mean more effective treatment and better outcomes. For this reason, where there is a possibility that symptoms could indicate cancer, people are referred urgently to see a specialist (on what is called a ‘two-week pathway’). The great majority of people referred this way do not have cancer, but it is important to see a specialist as soon as possible to confirm or exclude a cancer diagnosis.

This is explained further under Urgent Referral to Exclude Cancer. This includes information on what to expect and who to contact if there are any issues with getting the appointment within 2 weeks. There are also links to other support available.

Under Conditions which may not be funded on the NHS all the treatments which may not be funded under the NHS are included. To search all the treatments considered “low priority” look under “What treatments are usually not funded” in the frequently asked questions section.

Self-referrals

Self-referral involves accessing NHS health services and other support yourself without needing an appointment with your GP. This is explained further by patient info Self-referral | Patient. There are a large number of local self-referral routes, many are covered under Bucks Health Hub. We have listed some of the more common self-referrals under Contact Details And Self-Referral.

Private referrals

Private care contact details
Contact details for local private hospitals can be found under Local Contact Details and Service Finder.

Private referrals
Under the section Private Medical Care a number of aspects of private referrals are covered, in some cases you may not need a referral from your GP practice.

Private care can be a complex world to navigate. Some of the questions commonly asked of GPs about private medical care (hospital based) are included in the section Principles and support private medical care.

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