National Health Advisory Notification of Possible duplication of 'WA - WC' series NHI Numbers ADVISORY SUMMARY: There is a small risk that WA-WC series NHI numbers may be duplicated and display data associated with two people within the same record. A medical warning (see below) is being applied to the affected range of WA-WC series NHI numbers.
FOR THE ATTENTION OF: Received this email directly 1) DHB and Ambulance Single Points of Contact 2) DHB Emergency Planners / Managers 3) Public Health Unit Managers 4) Healthline Forward required 5) Medical Officers of Health 6) Chief Medical Officer 7) Director of Nursing 8) Relevant clinical and non-clinical staff in your DHB including on-call staff and labs 9) GP Liaison Officers 10) Communications Managers 11) Any other deemed necessary by your organisation
ACTIONS: 1. Recipients from groups 1-4 (above) acknowledge the receipt of this e-mail to nhcc_spoc@moh.govt.nz, other recipients need not acknowledge 2. Forward internally within your organisation as per the 'attention of section' above 3. PHU Managers to please forward to Medical Officers of Health who may not be on the distribution list above. 4. Please forward to your primary care contacts including: general practitioners, accident and minor facilities, pharmacists and primary health organisations in your region. ADVISORY The Ministry is aware of a potential problem with issuing "W" series National Health Index (NHI) numbers. The NHI system has been issuing these numbers nationally since 16 March 2018, but it has been brought to our attention that a block of 46,000 "W" series numbers was assigned by Whakatane hospital in the 1990s, prior to their local systems being integrated with the national NHI system These numbers were all deactivated and a process was undertaken to strip this data out of health sector systems more than a decade ago. All affected individuals at that time were set up with new NHI numbers in the national system. However, it appears some numbers have been included on paper documentation and subsequently entered into DHBs' systems (e.g. lab and radiology systems) at the time. In these cases it is possible that two patients (one recent and one historical) may be sharing data under a single NHI.
The exact size of the problem is uncertain and at this point indications are that only a small subset of the WA, WB, WC pre-fix numbers assigned by Whakatane may present any risk. As an immediate response the Ministry has changed the NHI to stop issuing numbers in the range that were previously issued by Whakatane. This will prevent any further identity confusion. As a follow up action the Ministry has commenced work with stakeholders to quantify the size of the issue and determine an appropriate remediation / communication strategy. This includes adding a Medical Warning to the range of affected NHIs to alert medical professionals to the risk of incorrectly linked historic lab results. This is a timely reminder for health professionals to always verify that the results they are looking at relate to the person in front of them. The Medical Warning is: WA, WB, WC NHI numbers may be duplicates that are incorrectly linking to lab system data from the 1990's. Please check that lab results you see relate to the patient in front of you and notify the lab of any inconsistencies.
The Ministry will communicate further about the results of the assessment and proposed actions next week when we have more detailed information.
If you have any queries about this communication please contact: Joel Brown - Manager Identity and Eligibility National Digital Services Technology and Digital Services Ministry of Health DDI: 04 816 3687 (This number will be monitored over the long weekend). Joel_Brown@moh.govt.nz
RESPONSE TEMPLATE (groups 1-4 only) On response please include the details below. Organisation Name Confirmation cascade has/will occur
This is an information/advisory only. No action is required other than to acknowledge receipt and distribute as described.