Flagging Files for Further Consideration

Using your software to flag a file for further screening

Often an eating disorder may be suspected, but there is no time to follow up in the current consultation, or the patient is not able to discuss it at that time. In this case, it could be useful for the team to have an eating disorders flag/action that will help to highlight this as a consideration for all practice GPs. Or your practice may also choose to screen a target group through setting up a recall. How the screener and the flags are used may depend on each doctor's preferences, or you may decide as a practice on a standard system.

QI Tip

Creating a flag in your software can help report on a practice improvement program. Use the appropriate field so that you can run your reports on the number screened and or followed up.

See the tutorials on ‘How to create a flag in your software’ for ideas specific to your software. For example, in Best Practice you could use an Action (consider an eating disorder?), this appears in the patient file alerts section and you can also run a report/search for this action to check on follow up. Another Action could be Screened for disordered eating. This could then be counted before and after a period to measure an increase in screening for feedback or quality improvement projects.

Some of these fields are used for other things, so check what works best for your practice.

In a busy practice, patients may see a number of different GPs. Flagging the file for further consideration is a way to help communicate risk.

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