Creating and sending discharge summaries and letters

Any letters associated with the discharge summary form must be signed before you can send the discharge summary form to pharmacy.

1. From  > Clinical pages > Patient List > select a patient > Patient detail, select Case Notes and select the current inpatient visit.

2. Select  > Medical Case Notes.

   

3. Select the medical case notes folder, select  > Medical Discharge Summary.

4. The discharge summary opens. Fields are populated if the data has been entered elsewhere in Nervecentre.

   

5. Complete the fields on the discharge summary form. Mandatory fields are marked .

   TTO medications and any arrival medications that remain stopped or paused on discharge are listed on the form.

   Medication cannot be modified from this page.

6. Digitally sign the letter.

   • There is now a clinical note included in the discharge summary form for digitally signing letters. The field label depends on your organisation, but might be called Letter. Select Not Signed > Sign.

   • You can remove your digital signature. From the same clinical note, select Un-sign.

   • You must digitally sign any letters associated with the discharge summary form before you send the form to the pharmacy or submit the form.

   • If you need to print a hard copy of the letter to sign, for example, if TTO medications include any controlled medications, you can generate and print the letter after you send the discharge summary form to the pharmacy.

     Read about printing letters

7. When you have completed the form:

   • If the discharge summary form includes TTO prescriptions, select Send to Pharmacy.

   • Or, if the discharge summary does not include any TTO prescriptions, select Approve, ward supplied TTO.

The discharge summary form is sent to pharmacy, who review TTO prescriptions.

Read more about the pharmacy review of TTO prescriptions

You can print a hard copy of a discharge letter. You might need a physical copy to sign, for example, if TTO medications include controlled medications. Or you might need a physical copy to complete work in dispensary.

1. When the discharge summary form is complete and sent to pharmacy, from the top of the discharge summary form, select Letter.

   The letter automatically generates.

2. To print, select .

When pharmacy has dispensed TTO medications, confirm the TTO medications are correct.

1. From  > Clinical pages > Patient List > select a patient > Patient detail, select Case Notes and find the discharge summary.

   Or, from your personal dashboard:

   1. Find the relevant ward summary and select Discharge summaries in progress.

   2. Double-click the patient's name to open the discharge summary.

2. Select Confirm ward received and verified.

You can now complete the discharge summary form and send the discharge letter.

When pharmacy has dispensed TTO medications, confirm the TTO medications are correct, and then create the letter and send it to the GP.

Letter still appears above the discharge summary at this stage, but selecting Letter is no longer part of the discharge workflow. Instead, follow the steps below.

1. From  > Clinical pages > Patient List > select a patient > Patient detail, select Case Notes and find the discharge summary.

   Or, from your personal dashboard:

   1. Find the relevant ward summary and select Discharge summaries in progress.

   2. Double-click the patient's name to open the discharge summary.

      Read more about personal dashboards

2. Select Complete, send discharge letter.

3. Select Click to preview letters to generate all letters associated with the discharge form.

   Note: Correspondance options includes an option for None. This option is not currently in use.

4. If you want to print a letter:

   1. From Letters/Texts, find the letter you want to print, and select view.

   2. To print, select .

5. To send the letter digitally to the GP, select Continue.

Nervecentre keeps a log of sent letters. You can view the log and select letters to print or send.

1. From  > Clinical pages > Patient List > select a patient > Patient detail, select Case Notes and find the discharge summary in the tree structure on the left.

2. Select ▼ > Show letters.

3. Select a letter from one of the following sections:

   Scheduled letters	Letters that are scheduled to be delivered at a later date or time.
   Requires attention	Letters that have failed to send.
   Sent letters	Letters that have been delivered. Select the letter to redeliver or regenerate.

   The letter is displayed without regenerating.

4. To print the letter, select .

5. If the letter is listed under Requires attention, you can select:

   • Delivered to manually mark the letter as delivered.

   • Discard to discard the letter.

   • Regenerate to regenerate the letter and include any changes.

When you send or print a discharge letter, the letter regenerates automatically to populate the letter with the most recent information.

If another user updates any details that appear on the discharge summary, the updated details appear in the discharge letter.

You can check what has changed, when, and who changed it in Case Notes.

1. Find the case note for the discharge summary and select  Show history.

   

2. To see the history for a specific clinical note within the discharge form, mouseover the field and select  > Show history.