Routine Referrals and Referral Guidelines
Routine referrals
All routine referrals that need to be made using a GOS18 are via the GP in Dudley.
Click here for an editable version of the Dudley GOS18 Routine Referral form.
If you are considering referring to request dry eye drops please see this page
Effective from now there are new Dudley Referral Guidelines for Optoms. These include a guide as to which conditions require what urgency as well as where and how to refer patients suspected of having them.
Onward referrals to the HES are likely to be via ‶Choose and Book″ (CaB). This system provides two ways for a GP surgery to find an appointment in the correct service (e.g. clinic). These are via “Clinic Type” or via a “Clinical Term”. Please note that the person doing this booking may not be a doctor.
Therefore when completing the GOS18 the priority is to complete ‶Clinic Type″ – Tick just one – the most urgent
N.B Ensure you complete the correct Adult or Child section. Adults are 16 or over.
These Clinic Types are fixed and are the same throughout England.
When a Clinic Type is entered on CaB all the services linked to it are displayed. For a simple one (such as Cataract) this will show all the clinics seeing cataracts and nothing else.
Other Clinic Types may result in a range of different clinics being offered. However these
clinics may only see a subset of the conditions covered by the Clinic Type. For instance
Oculoplastic / Orbit / Lacrimal may link to a nurse led cyst service, a lid malposition
(entropion etc) service or a service exclusively for lacrimal problems.
If a range of different types of clinic are offered the GP surgery will need to select the correct one.
They can do so on the basis of a ‶Clinic Term″ you have entered (see below) and/or the additional information you put on the free text part of the form.
Then Complete “Clinical Term” – enter as many as is appropriate. This information will be entered by the GP practice in the search field. In CaB this will show all the services which see patients with this problem or diagnosis.This is particularly useful for conditions that the GP may not recognise, such as ‶Keratoconus″ or ‶Macular Dystrophy″
You must provide both a Clinic Type and Clinical Term for all patients.
For Optometrists who have NHSMail accounts the Urgent Referral Form can be sent to the GP via NHSMail. Always contact the GP practice first to ensure the correct NHSMail address for the GP
practice.
The CUES service has its own Routine Referral Pathway