Which type of hospital discharge report reaches general practitioners most quickly?

Abstract

Patients recently discharged from hospital often have to be followed up by their general practitioners in the absence of any information from the hospital because of delays of several days before a discharge note reaches the practice. Some hospitals have combined the form for prescribing treatment for patients to take home with them with the discharge note. Thus a note is automatically written to the general practitioner for any patient who is given drugs to take home before that patient can be discharged. The note should be posted before, or at the time of, discharge. This combined discharge note and prescription form should reach the general practitioner more quickly on average than a separate discharge note, which is usually written when the junior hospital doctor can find time, not necessarily at the time of the patient's discharge. We carried out a study to assess this.

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