Private referral question- please help

[Janel85]

I need to get what’s called an open referral letter from my gp tomorrow morning for my daughter to see a paediatrician privately. Spoke to the insurers- AXA about it today, I was very emotional and while I took down lots of info about what I needed to get my GP to do, I stupidly didn’t ask if the open referral needs to be addressed to my insurer AXA or to the hospital that I want my daughter to be referred to? I’ve googled and googled this but all I can find is an open referral form that every other private health insurance company seems to have available apart from AXA. There’s an example from BUPA that I can take to show my GP but that doesn’t help because BUPA does both insurance and hospitals. If anyone could shed some light on open referrals I would be grateful. The appointment is first thing and my GP suregery seems to be slightly difficult/clueless about referrals based on my past experience. Thanks

It might be worth speaking to the practice manager if the GP doesn't know ? Hopefully they or someone else in the practice has dealt with this before and will know. Or ask for a copy addressed to each ? (They may have to anyway)

Hey.

I recently got an a referral from GP to a private hospital with Bupa as the insurer.
I was told an open referral was made to the Dr from my GP.

Not sure if that helps.

I'm with AXA and have done this for my son (and myself).

Ask your GP for a private open referral, they know what to do.

If you have a consultant in mind you must ensure you check with AXA that they are AXA registered before you book an appointment. Otherwise if you don't know a suitable specialist you can ask AXA to search their database.

Hope that helps.

Thanks for all the replies, MiniMaxi, did your gp address the letter to AXA or to the consultant though if you don’t mind me asking? Thanks

My understanding is that an open referral is just a referral that isn't to a specific/named consultant. When I've been given them before, it's not actually been addressed to anyone.

The open referral from the GP would usually be addressed to “Consultant Paediatrician” at whichever hospital you’re being seen at. Hope that helps.

I'm a secretary at a GP surgery. If we don't know who the private referral is going to (usually because the GP didn't ask the patient) then we do a "to whom it may concern" letter

When we asked for ds to be referred, we went to the dr who agreed. We went home and called cigna who gave us a number to call at the relevant hospital/department and an authorisation code.

We called the hospital and made the appointment which was in 3 days, took the details of the dr, then called my gp's secretaries with the details and they sent the referral directly to the dr/hospital. As it was short notice they also made a copy of the referral which I picked up and took to the appointment, just in case it never made it in the post on timel