MMR message from surgery -claim my 17 year old "may not have had both jabs"

[bellinisurge]

Daughter had a message from GP surgery which came to me. It said she may not have had both doses of MMR according to her records.
Obviously it's some round robin sent to everyone within a certain age range to get everyone jabbed. As they should.

But it obviously isn't checked against her actual record.
So I had to waste my time and the surgery's time checking her record.

Her birth and the aftermath was very traumatic and very badly handled by the local NHS provision. It would not have surprised me to learn they fecked up her records.

Just venting at the time wasting incompetence. And I am firmly pro-vaccines.

I'm a GP,records for this cohort are often inaccurate, it's not our fault or within our power to change. Better one unnecessary reminder than someone misses out

It is not sent to everyone.
A search will be done and those who haven’t had both jabs, or those who have had both jabs but it hasn’t been coded correctly so it appears they haven’t had both jabs, are sent a message. This way when people respond it can be looked into, rather than hundreds of hours spent wasted checking each individuals record. There isn’t enough man hours in the practice for that.

Would you rather they hadn’t contacted you(r) daughter and she be at risk of not being protected?

Rather they send out some incorrect information than some teens missing out.

It’s not personal.

There was a thing a few months ago whete loads of parents randomly recieved that message in error. We did... but all her vaccination records are up to date.

My DD’s vaccination records from the GP were completely wrong in general. She needed a proper record for university. All sorts of things they said she didn’t have when she had. I still had her red book to prove it.

I'm with you OP. They have completely wasted your time. If someone hasn't had their second MMR then the surgery should take it up with them.

I'm fucking fed up with time wasters trying to save themselves money by making me do all the work. This morning I had a letter from physio asking me to ring and make an appointment because they've tried to ring me but couldn't get through. Guess what ! They didn't fucking ring me at all.

How much of your time was wasted checking her red book? About 3 seconds?

It's pretty much a standard text, asking you to check, if a computer search hasn't recognised both doses for your child. I had one for my 12 year old, double checked her red book & that was that.

Your DD would only have had 1 dose at 17 months anyway surely?

I got that too. Because DD has the first dose in one country and the second in another.
I knew she'd had both, checked the date.
Took about 90 seconds.
I'm just thankful we have a healthcare system that prioritizes children's health in this way.

OP said her daughter was 17 years old (not months), assuming this wasn’t a typo?
to be fair, lots of people might not still have the red book to hand after that amount of time.
I agree with the PP that said the alert probably only went out to those who genuinely haven’t received both jabs or have been coded incorrectly. I doubt it was to everyone.

I get these all the time. DD had some of her baby vaccines when we lived abroad and I’ve told the practice nurse this several times but the messages accusing me of being an anti vaxer keep coming.

So, did you check her red book?
Has she had both?
FWIW, she can have 100, 1000 extra MMR jabs and be safe...you can't overdose on it, either she has got antibodies or not.
If you haven't got your own records of her vaccinations, best to get her in to GP surgery for an MMR jab.
(Practice nurse)

@Justsomethoughts sorry - I misread. My mistake!

We had this with dd. She was born and lived abroad until age 4 so NHS had no record of any of her early vaccinations, which were also done to a different schedule including mmr at a year and 18 months. I copied her equivalent of red book records for the gp records. However when she was due to do work experience at our local hospital it came up again. OH tested her blood instead and it showed she had no immunity to Rubella so subsequently had another mmr jab. So just because they have two jabs they may not develop full immunity.

She's 17 years old. Surprisingly I don't have her red book to hand. Because, why would I?
I made them check. She's up to date on their records. So I have no idea where this "your record suggests you may not have had both doses" nonsense comes from.

Maybe they could have worded it better if they wanted to catch everyone

how strange I got one today also but am sure they did.

I would imagine the current measles outbreaks have initiated additional checks.

Exactly what I was going yo say. It doesn't pick up those who had the jabs separately either.

I had received this and confirmed she had had it, but then she changed Dr and she has now at 19 had a message to say she has gaps. ALl I can do is tell her to check with new GP. I have packed up alot of my house for reno purposes no red book from age 0 not to hand here either

I have to say I think it is a disingenuous way to up the no. vaxxed for measles in particular due to the current level of cases due to lack of vaccinations and dropping below the % for herd immunity for this age group for those that can't have the vax

It's fairly straightforward to have a blood test to see if your son has the antibodies. NHS occupational health departments do it for NHS new starters all the time. It'll be a lot quicker than the alternatives.

I don’t think the records are great - I needed a tetanus jab recently and the nurse at the hospital said I had to have it because I wasn’t confident when I had it last and there’s issues with GP records appearing on other systems.

Depending how the text system is set up it may be sent by another part of the NHS on the GP’s behalf and then it all hinges on sharing the right data.

i of course don’t know about your GP surgery, but there are MMR messages being sent out by NHS England which is nothing to do with GP practices. I know this because I work in one and have patients booking in on the back of this when they are already up to date.

I will mention that the system most used across the NHS and GP surgeries to record these things is System One, run and created by TPP, owned by Frank Hester. It's truly awful system that looks like and operates like windows 1995 (I'm not even exaggerating) I wouldn't be surprised if records have been lost. Frank has been in the news recently because it's come to light he's given the Tories huge donations of the tune of £10million as well as being a big old racist...... well I guess there has to be a reason the Government keeps giving him billions of pounds to provide an NHS database that the average 11 year old could design better.

That's because he's flogged them an Access database file, not a bespoke database crafted from scratch for the particular needs and technological setup of the NHS.

I often end up helping the staff at my GP surgery to use it when I'm there for an appointment.

Money for old rope, is Access. Even I can program it.

Systems and coding have improved in the last 16 years but are still far from perfect. There has been a measles outbreak so it is in all of our interests to mop up those that missed a vaccine or booster and no harm done to anyone if your daughter has to check her records.
As per pp not everyone forms antibodies to the vaccines so getting percentages up is protecting us all.