COVID-19 vaccination record queries

1. When a patient is vaccinated, a record is made in a clinical system at the point of care:

• at a GP practice, primary care network (PCN), or community pharmacy, the point of care system is predominantly Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle) but could also be provided by a number of other system suppliers
• at a vaccination centre, the point of care system is either Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle) or the National Immunisation Vaccination System (NIVS) app
• hospitals use the NIVS or the National Immunisation Management System (NIMS) app to record when they have vaccinated staff members or patients

2. This data then comes either directly to the GP system or via the Data Processing Service (DPS):

• for practices using TPP, data from Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle) is added automatically to the patient’s GP record via direct integration - data from all other point of care systems including the NIVS or NIMS app (except from the TPP SystmOne Hub solution) will come via the DPS 
• for practices using EMIS, data from all point of care systems is currently sent via the DPS
• for practices using Vision, data from all point of care systems is sent via the DPS

3. Once the vaccination record has been added to the patient's medical records, it will appear in the vaccinations section of the Summary Care Record.

Vaccination records should appear in the patient's medical records in GP systems within 48 hours of the entry into the point of care system.

Reasons for missing records (more than 48 hours after the vaccination event) include:

• the record was made on paper and has not yet been entered into Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle) or another point of care system
• the data has not been fully completed at the vaccination site due to a final save not being completed - if the site is your own site and you are using Pinnacle, you can check for incomplete records using the incomplete records report in the admin screen, and if not, you should ask the site where the event occurred to do this check
• mandatory fields were missing or not populated correctly in the point of care system
• the NHS number entered could not be verified – for example, if it doesn’t match up to demographic details provided – the record will be sent to National Back Office (NBO) for verification, and this can take up to another 7 days

You can contact the vaccination site to seek clarification and find out the reason for the record not being processed.

If a missing first record of the dose prevents booking the appointment for the second dose, please contact the vaccination site to check that the record was entered successfully. It is also possible to manually book the vaccination for the patient. The vaccination site will be able to correctly record the second dose.

If you see incorrect information on the vaccine record, such as the wrong batch code or SNOMED code, correct it in the point of care system being used by the vaccination site to ensure the correction flows through the data collection process. 

If you see an inaccurate vaccine record, (such as, the patient was not vaccinated but you can see a record of their vaccination), the record needs to be cancelled at the vaccination site in the point of care system being used. The vaccination site is also advised to check their booking system to make sure the correct record is entered in place of the incorrect one, so that there is no confusion of NHS numbers on entry.

If the record cannot be easily corrected, the incorrect record will prevent the patient from booking a vaccine appointment. In this case it is advised to manually book the patient for the vaccine. The vaccination site will be able to enter the record as a duplicate first or second dose.

All corrections will be applied to NIMS records.

How and when corrections appear in the patient's GP record will depend on the clinical system.

For TPP practices/ PCNs, using Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle), corrections will automatically be sent from Outcomes4Health (Pinnacle) and other point of care systems in around 30 minutes. Once received, the GP practice should manually process these corrections.

EMIS and Vision do not currently receive automatic corrections.

For queries about vaccine payments, get more information on the Future NHS collaboration platform (you will need to register if you don't have a Future NHS account).

• PCN payments guidance
• PCN FAQs
• CP payments guidance
• CP FAQs

Additional support

FutureNHS provides up-to-date guidance on escalating issues. If you need additional support, please contact your System Vaccination Operations Centre (SVOC) in the first instance. If you are unsure which SVOC to contact, please ask your site lead or find your SVOC.

You may need to request access to FutureNHS.

General

Pinnacle

For further queries, medical staff can contact the Vaccination Service Desk on 0300 200 1000. (This service is for medical staff use only).

When you get in touch with us, make sure you include the relevant information so that we can investigate your query quickly.

Training materials  for Pinnacle are available at Home Page - Outcomes4Health                               

Training materials for Eva Health's eVacc are available at Training - Eva Health Technologies

We're working with clinical system suppliers so that vaccination centres have a greater choice of clinical systems to record vaccinations and send the information on to the DPS.