Volume 15, Number 5, September-October 2008

Referral: four principles and 10 steps
Terry McCormack, Henry Purcell

When any doctor or nurse refers to a colleague they should automatically ask themselves: is this referral necessary and will it benefit the patient? Referral should never be an automatic choice and the circumstances may dictate a different option. An extreme example is the terminally ill patient with severe central chest pain. Even if they are suffering a myocardial infarction, urgent admission may not be the best option in their care. Unnecessary referral wastes the time of both clinicians and patients. It adds to waiting times for more needy patients. Equally we could be guilty of under referral and could be providing less than perfect care for our patients.

Br J Cardiol 2008;15:225.

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