Hospital trust apologises after finding 24,000 letters were not sent

A hospital trust has admitted it failed to send out 24,000 letters to GPs since 2018 and is checking to see if patients were affected.

The Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals Trust has apologised for any “anxiety or inconvenience” caused after confirming documents, including discharge summaries and clinic letters, may not have been sent out over the last five years.

The trust, which runs the two main hospitals in Newcastle – the Freeman Hospital and the Royal Victoria Infirmary – said the documents represented less than 0.3% of all patient contacts and is taking “immediate steps to address the issue” and “working quickly to put things right”.

Chief operating officer Martin Wilson said that earlier this month the trust “identified a number of documents in our electronic patient record which may not have been sent to GPs”, including “discharge summaries and clinic letters, as well as internal documents from the last five years”.

The oversight was uncovered after routine inspections by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in June and July.

A computer glitch put letters requiring sign-off from a senior doctor into a folder few staff knew existed, according to the BBC.

Most of the letters explain what should happen when patients are discharged from hospital, but a significant number of the unsent letters are written by specialist clinics spelling out care that is needed for patients.

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It means that some crucial tests and results may have been missed by patients.

“We sincerely apologise for any anxiety or inconvenience this may cause,” Mr Wilson said.

“Every single patient contact is very important to us and we are working to understand if there has been any impact to ongoing care and treatment.

“We are currently reviewing 24,000 documents from our electronic records. This includes both correspondence and internal documents and accounts for less than 0.3% of all our patient contacts.”

He added: “This review is already under way and will be completed as quickly as possible over the next two months. If any concerns are identified, we will inform patients and their GPs directly.

“We are taking this issue very seriously and are working quickly to put things right.”

Sarah Dronsfield, CQC’s interim director of operations for the North Network, said: “We inspected several core services at Newcastle upon Tyne NHS Trust in June and July 2023 as part of our routine inspection activity.

“Following that inspection, in September 2023, CQC received concerns from trust staff about risks to patient safety caused by delays in sending out patient correspondence”

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