19th June 2015
The new e-referral system is back online again after technical issues forced it to shut down this week. Despite only being rolled out this Monday, the system has been rife with technical glitches meaning that GPs were unable to log on, delaying referrals and as a result, resorting to faxing and posting documents. The Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) introduced the system to replace Choose and Book, an older platform itself unpopular with practitioners because of its instability. The HSCIC issued a report indicating that on Wednesday 17th, no major issues were identified. “We will, however, continue to monitor around the clock as our first priority remains ensuring minimal disruption to patients and professional users.”
Commenting GPs have been vocal in their criticism of the program, with one remarking its similarity to Choose and Book – “only the font has changed.”