To wonder if my GP has some sort of scam going?! "Smoking cessation advice" for a non-smoker

[LizB62A]

I've never smoked - this is relevant.

I've just picked up a referral letter from my GP for an ENT consultation and they've attached a brief summary of my GP appointment history (not a lot of detail but enough)

Over the last 17 years, there are 7 separate entries which state "Smoking cessation advice"

I've never been given advice to stop smoking as I don't smoke

I'm wondering if there is there some sort of NHS bonus paid to GPs who encourage their patients to stop smoking?

Does anyone know ?!

Yes Sashkin I am sure records were made then - read my post - but what I can assure you is yours, mine and everybody else's here will not be correct. No way. I have seen mine in full, they were laughable and a complete fiction.

Unless you were born after 2018.

This article explains it maybe:
www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1763

Also, I have worked in the NHS and have no idea what Al203 is going on about.

If you have concerns about your GP records, you can make a request to the practice to see them, and you will be able to - there may be a charge. If there are any inaccuracies, you can get them corrected.

But those 'smoking advice given' will be codes that have been automatically put in so that they get their money - because they get no money for not putting them in, even if you don't smoke, as explained in the article. You have every right to ask for them to be removed though.

My records definitely go back that far.

From the printout I received today - 3 sheets of A4:
Oct 2016 Smoking cessation advice
Mar 2011 Smoking cessation advice
Mar 2010 Smoking cessation advice
Feb 2010 Smoking cessation advice
Feb 2008 Smoking cessation advice
Jun 2003 Smoking cessation advice
Dec 2002 Smoking cessation advice

Along with a one-liner of what looks like every other GP appointment I've had since July 2002

I'll be asking them to correct my records and I'll also be taking it further as I've found out today that they've done the same to one of my sisters (she's asthmatic and also definitely not a smoker)

TBF I lost my faith in my surgery after they labelled 8 years of blood results "normal"
Nope. All abnormal... I have a print out from 2008 that shows they were abnormal yet it took until 2015 for me to get a diagnosis

I’m a GP.
Most likely someone has accidentally ticked the wrong box on the smoking template.
There’s no money available for giving advice to non smokers

That's awful

There’s no money available for giving advice to non smokers

Sounds like fraud. Funny that GP's always go on about how they "only" get £50 per patient per year but forget to mention all these extras they get based on patients' conditions and extra "services" allegedly given.

I always say you know when the GP get extra funding for something because they're the only things they're keen on. Falling over themselves to give flu jabs (extra ££) but drag their feet on other things that don't give them extra money.

I suspect they get more dosh for depression/MH as literally every time I see my GP, he/she asks whether I'm depressed. Wouldn't surprise me if they want to "tick a box" for depression so they can get money for giving depression advice.

Smoking cessation advice round here is...
"Are you ready to give up yet?"