Understanding the patient registration email

You will receive an email once a patient finishes registering online with your GP surgery. This is the patient registration email. It captures the information the patient provided in their registration.

This email is important. You cannot progress a patient application without it.

The patient registration email should contain all the patient information needed to process their registration with your surgery.

The answers may vary but you will always be provided with their:

• personal details

• health question answers

• carer status 

For the patients who have used NHS login, you should be able to identify them without any other details.

The information in the patient registration email is found in:

• the body of the email 

• a PDF attachment

The information in the PDF attachment is identical to the contents of the email.

The PDF is provided as some practices attach the completed form to the patient record. 

The email starts by telling you that you have a new registration request from a patient. It also gives you the patient's registration:

• reference number
• submission date 

The email also tells you the patient's registration type is, as well as if they:

• used NHS login to access the service
• matched with PDS 

You will then see a section highlighted in blue titled important information. This highlights information that may affect the patient's registration, for example if a patient might be vulnerable.

It should look like this:

The way a patient answers the questions will determine what is shown in these highlighted areas.

You might see any number of the following highlighted details appearing in this box:

• patient used NHS login
• patient did not use NHS login
• patient matched in PDS
• patient not matched in PDS
• patient matched to record in PDS, but not to NHS number
• patient matched to record in PDS, which has a date of death
• no PDS match due to technical issue
• patient is a young carer or unpaid carer
• patient has a young carer or unpaid carer
• patient has social worker
• patient vaccinations not up to date
• patient vaccinations done outside the UK
• registration completed by dependent

The rest of the email should then follow a consistent format showing you how the patient answered the questions they were asked. 

If a patient has not answered a question it will show this:

Patients cannot leave mandatory questions unanswered. You should only see this response for optional questions.

You should still have all the information you need to progress their registration, even they have not answered multiple questions.

If you accept a patient registration you can ask more questions specific to your surgery later on. 

The service uses as much of the available patient information provided to match a patient to their Personal Demographics Service (PDS) record.

This record is the national electronic database of NHS patients and includes details such as:

• name
• address
• NHS number

The majority of patient registrations using the online service have their information successfully matched with their PDS record. This provides a faster and more accurate service for patients and GP surgeries.