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Alan Hassey, on insurance companies that don't enclose consent forms: > This flies in the face of the BMA security policy & guidelines - I'd be > interested to hear a comment from Ross... Well, you learn something new every day, and what I learned yesterday was that private detective types are now pretending to be insurance companies and faxing requests for PMAs to practices. This came out at the EMIS user group conference. A practice that had suffered such a scam has now adopted the policy of requiring the patient to attend as the report is filled out. Previously, my idea of prudent practice had been to telephone the patient to make sure that the consent was both valid and informed. But attendance has other benefits. You might for example have a note such as `depression?' in the record which the patient will strongly dispute, and which if mentioned to an insurer could cause prejudice. So my feeling at this time is that the report should be mentioned to the patient, but I have an open mind about whether this should be done on the phone or face to face. Probably best to exercise a judgment on the basis of circumstances; after all, no need to haul in a fit young athlete just to tell him that you will be filing a perfect report! Ross %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%