Hypoglycaemia Notifications from South East Coast Ambulance Service (SECAmb).
Several years ago, SECAmb collaborated with the Diabetes Leads in Surrey to develop a system for informing GPs across the SECAmb area about their diabetic patients’ episodes of hypoglycaemia. The original system required SECAmb crews to manually complete a web-based form that was sent to the GP Practice. While this system had some success, it was not popular among staff due to the need to duplicate data into a separate system. This led to a falling number of notifications. In response, we have developed and deployed an automated system that identifies episodes of hypoglycaemia from submitted electronic patient clinical records (ePCR). This change has significantly increased the number of notifications sent, which is positive, but has also increased the small number of inappropriate notifications.
The types of inappropriate notifications include those sent to the incorrect GP practice; those relating to patients who are diabetic, or whose hypoglycaemia is not relevant to their ongoing primary healthcare. Occasionally, coding errors also occur that prompt erroneous notifications.
The original intention of the system was to alert GPs of hypoglycaemic episodes that they would otherwise not be aware of and allow consideration for follow-up where necessary. The increase in overall notifications has meant more GPs are aware of their patient’s interaction with SECAmb. We recognise that the inappropriate notifications may be frustrating, and we wanted to thank you for your patience in the event of receiving one of these. If you do receive one, you can email us to let us know after which you can delete the notification in line with your practice’s information governance processes. There is no option to opt-out of these notifications, but at a practice level, the overall numbers you receive each year should be few.
