Birth name and medical records

[Whatutalkinboutwillis]

Me again!! Quick question for those who have completed their adoptions.

Now we have ds adoption/birth certificate I took it to the doctor surgery to have his personal details amended. The lovely (being sarcastic) receptionist informed me his original name would be kept on his records so that pre adoption medical information would be available. She then processed to loudly check his birth name in front of a queue of people which I was none to pleased at.

My question is should his medical information from birth not be available through his nhs number? I am in no means trying to re write history and fully accept he had a life and other name before coming to us however I don't think now he is legally adopted that his previous name should pop up in the screen at the doctors. Anyone else dealt with this?

Thanks for the links. So what I know is that ds was issued a new nhs number and card when he moved to us last year as it was sent to me. His post adoption medical visits (very few) have been transferred to his new file (scanned). The only link to him being adopted is under any previous names which is where his birth name is and its this the gp receptionist is refusing to remove.

Sorry meant to say pre adoption medical visits were transferred

How far back do people/NHS workers actually look though. Once a child has been adopted for five or six years and may be grows up and gets married and changes their name again, providing there are no serious or long term illnesses from the early days, do the notes that far back ever get looked at again?

Just wondering if this is being a bit overthought. As for the concerns about something being missed from under the old name is that really a big issue? So many times people looking after me or my DC have missed really important stuff when it's been waved under their noses, I find it difficult to think it can be all that important to have a record of absolutely everthing stretching back years and years.

In fairness to the receptionist if they are on electronic records she will only have the "rights" to change or alter certain information (as a satellite type professional I can't alter key info such names, gp practice etc but can update telephone numbers) but a bit of diplomacy wouldn't have gone amiss.

What my issue is that now everything is electronic it's there in black and White on his main details page when anyone in the nhs brings up his medical record. He could see it himself at the gp when he is older long before we have intended to share his birth name with him when we as parents feel he is old enough to use the information as he sees fit with a mature head on his shoulders.

It was more her attitude of "we won't remove his previous name" end of story. Then proceeded to say the name to check it was correct. I should have asked to see the manager there and then but wanted to come away calm down and check the policy. Shame there does not appear to be one

Is it any comfort that when I look at the screen at the doctors I can't see my maiden name anywhere. When they used to use the little brown packets instead it was on the front, crossed out but it doesn't seem to work like that anymore.

It's hard to say - I work with children and if we needed to know whether our particular service had been involved before (and how long) and what intervention had been done previously or we wanted to know things around birth history, developmental history etc then maybe we would need info. Not reams but past reports rather than every entry.

hopefully (and you can always live in hope!) though we would know adoption was imminent and if a change of professional was also coinciding the precautions for a solid handover would be in place.

Unusual but did happen to me - I went on mat leave and a key report was needed which would have included the history and previous intervention so I made sure I handed it over before the record was locked down but we had reasonable notice and we put measures in place. Same with complaints or claims I would guess. Unusual but not unheard of.

Sorry my post was to Beaufortbelle

Maybe slightly off topic op but I thought every child born in hospital was automatically given his mother's surname so even when they are registered officially at the registry office that shows on the medical record (certainly does on ours if you look long enough for it) but surely they don't check that too???

I don't think we are overthinking this, BeaufortBelle. Many of our children have both complex health needs and security concerns - it shouldn't be too much to ask for information flow that doesn't compromise that security. In my dd's case, it was a lengthy task to get her medical records transferred and during that time I was battling an extremely unhelpful GP (who, for example, was extremely reluctant to prescribe the specialist formula that my dd was on, and gave me real grief for insisting that she could not have live vaccines until she was cleared of HIV and Hep at 18 months). It was really hard to battle all this with only verbal information passed on from the fc, and no paper record to back me up.

And actually, confidentiality is hugely important. Some kids have birth names that are very recognisable or even notorious. They deserve better than to be the gossip of the waiting room.

Thank you for explaining that Devora. I hadn't understood the complexity.

I agree completely that confidentiality is very important and wouldn't ever suggest that any child (or any adult for that matter) should be gossiped about in the waiting room. If that happens often that is very poor - I'd hope it didn't happen at all.

Thanks Collysmill

That does sound a good system, because it would stop the old name being called in waiting rooms.
It must be such a worry for adoptive parents, another example of a system improving for the worse, if it doesn't protect those it should.

I don't know what is supposed to happen, but DD got a new NHS card with a new number when we changed her name with the GP. All straightforward enough. Except they didn't change her middle name so I've been in a bit of a battle to get it sorted properly - note to self, must continue that one