GP Referrals and Pre-choice Triage

Rapid Referral Review (RRR) or Specialist Advice Guidance and Expertise (SAGE) is now going to be called Pre-choice Triage (the acronym will no doubt be PCT!).

In those specialties where this is happening your referral will be seen by a consultant within 48 hours.

Currently this is only happening in urology for the whole of Devon. There are pilots in a variety of other specialties including rheumatology, gastroenterology, gynaecology, paediatrics, dermatology and cardiology.

The plan is to roll out Pre-choice triage consistently across all localities and specialties.

Because your patient may be suitable for advice and guidance, or to go straight for a test, when making a referral please do not promise a face to face consultation with a specialist.

DRSS have produced an initial advice sheet to explain the above options for patients which you can use within your practice.

When the consultant reviews the referral letter this may result in:

Advice and Guidance (A and G) back to the practice
Sending the patient straight to a test
An upgrade to an urgent appointment
An upgrade to a 2ww appointment
A consultant or non consultant outpatient appointment

As a result of closer collaboration with secondary care and in line with the roll out of Pre-choice Triage many more CRGs are already in production. We will keep you updated prior to their publication.

Please see below a list of those specialties where PCT is currently live, please note this will be updated as new specialties go live:

Specialty	Northern	Eastern
Cardiology	No	No
Orthopaedics	Yes	No
Dermatology	No	Yes
Ear, Nose & Throat	Yes	Yes
Gynaecology	No	Yes
GI & Liver	Yes	No
Urology	Yes	No
Diabetic Medicine	No	Yes
Endocrinology	No	Yes
Haematology	Yes	Yes
Health Promotion, Weight Management	No	Yes
Rheumatology	Yes	Yes
Neurology	No	Yes
Nephrology	No	Yes
Respiratory Medicine	Yes	No
Pain Management	Yes	Yes
Paediatrics	Yes	Yes
Vascular	Yes	No

Updated: 03 January 2018
Published: 30 November 2016