Diary entry guidance
What is a diary entry?
A diary entry is primarily a proposal for clinical action to be undertaken at an indicative date in the future, which has not been completed or cancelled. The diary entry is dated but unscheduled - that is, it is not an appointment (but may result in an appointment being created) and resources are not directly committed to it. The diary entry may be a reminder for a review, a follow up to a consultation / treatment / test, a recall or treatment to be provided according to a schedule. Diary entries may be known as ‘recalls’ within some GP clinical systems.
The use of diary entries may vary significantly from one practice to another and may not have any constraint in the scope as to what can be selected as the action associated to the diary entry. Some examples of actions which may be recorded as diary entries are:
- Antipsychotic injections
- Asthma review
- Cytology Smear
- Depo Provera
- Diabetes review
- Epilepsy review
- Mental Health review
- NHS Health checks (5years)
- Over 75 Check
- Seasonal influenza vaccination due
- Repeat Blood tests
Any future intention for a clinical action recorded as an Appointment, Warning / Alert or Task is out of scope.
Medication reviews
Medication reviews are considered to fall under the definition of a diary entry.
GP clinical systems which have a separate feature for medication reviews MUST include the medication reviews within diary entries.
The entered medication review code can be sent or the provider MAY substitute with the SNOMED CT code 314529007 | Medication review due (situation) | as most appropriate.
Hereafter, reference to diary entries MUST be assumed to include medication reviews.
Consumers should be aware that medication reviews may occur in addition to the main, planned medication review(s) recorded in the GP clinical system and shared via this resource.
Diary entry status
The scope of diary entries is limited to incomplete actions only - that is, complete or cancelled diary entries MUST NOT be included.
GP clinical systems have differing approach to allocating status to incomplete diary entries.
It is unlikely that there is sufficient consistency of use of status, so all incomplete diary entries MUST be given a standard status of active.
The diary entry may not be updated automatically or immediately upon the action being taken to which it relates. Consumers are to be aware that this may result in the inclusion of diary entries in a response which are incomplete in the GP system but have been actioned.
Diary entry code
GP clinical systems MUST populate the code with a valid SNOMED CT code wherever practical.
GP clinical systems MAY include codes for incomplete diary entries which have a standard interpretation of a completed action (for example, procedure codes).
These MUST be interpreted as incomplete by consumer systems.
Consumer systems MUST ensure these are presented to system users in such a manner that it is clear and unambiguous that the coded item represents an incomplete planned action regardless of its text description or SNOMED CT meaning.
The consumer system MUST maintain the diary entry’s meaning as an incomplete planned action wherever the code element may be accessed or exported.
Diary entry planned date
The planned date may be a single date or a date range according to the source GP clinical system and local recording practice. The GP clinical system provider is to determine whether its data supports the inclusion of a period for the planned date or can only meaningfully return a single planned date. Wherever feasible and meaningful, a date period is preferred. The planned date(s) may represent an earliest date, latest date, indicative date or a combination but this may vary by record / use and the resource will not provide distinctions in this respect.
Consumers may include a part parameter to return only diary entries up to a selected date in the future.
As the search filter only provides an upper boundary and has to be a future date, diary entries which are active and have passed their planned date will always be included.
Full details about search criteria for diary entries is detailed in the Search criteria and API Definition - Retrieve a patient's structured record pages.
Using the List resource for diary entry queries
The results of a query for diary entry details MUST return a List containing references to all ProcedureRequest resources that are returned.
The List MUST be populated in line with the guidance on List resources.
If the List is empty, then an empty List MUST be returned with an emptyReason with the value no-content-recorded.