All doctors and nurse practitioners can now complete the medical certificates of cause of death and cremation forms via the new online Death Documents platform, instead of filling in paper forms. Online documents can be filled in on computers, tablets and mobile devices with internet access. We now have 140 registered users and over 300 documents have been completed online. Feedback from early adopters has been positive and the Ministry is now keen to increase awareness and uptake of the new service. Why are we doing this? The new online platform has key benefits: • • •
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It is easier for health practitioners to complete the forms accurately. Health practitioners can complete and amend the forms anywhere, anytime, on a range of devices as long as they have internet access. Documents submitted online are instantly sent to the Ministry of Health so that notification to the health sector about someone’s death can happen more quickly, reducing risk of an appointment reminder being sent to a deceased person, for instance. It is easier for funeral directors to register the death with the Department of Internal Affairs. The Department of Internal Affairs receives an early notification of each death, independent of the death registration. This allows timely chasing up of any missing death registrations.
Future plans Ongoing enhancements are being made to Death Documents. • • •
Funeral directors will be able to access the documents online in coming weeks. This will mean doctors will no longer have to print the forms. We are working to integrate with the National Health Index (NHI) to pre-populate the patient details and make it quicker for practitioners to complete a document. In a future phase we will have Medical Referees able to view the documents online and complete their certificate to cremate.
Access Death Documents Practitioners can access Death Documents at deathdocs.services.govt.nz. Further information about completing Death Documents is available on the Ministry website Completing death documents.