Letters to GPs, patients and others

A GP letter from a note

Open a signed clinical note and press Write letter (the GP letter is chosen for you). The letter opens already filled in: the GP's name and practice address from the patient's record, the patient's details, and your note's findings and plan. Read it through, change anything you like, then press Finish letter. To send it, press Email the PDF (the practice's email is filled in when the practice has one) or Download PDF to attach it to your NHS secure email.

Draft from the note

On plans that include AI, Draft from the note rewrites the note's lists into a proper letter in the template's wording. The patient's name is taken out first and filled back in afterwards, and their date of birth, address and contact details are never sent, so the letter is drafted without anyone outside Hally knowing who it's about. Until your clinic has switched on sending clinical notes for drafting (as for the AI scribe), or when the month's AI allowance is used up, the note is written into the template as it is instead. Either way, read it before you finish: you are signing it.

Letters from the patient's record

In a patient's record, Letters lists every letter about them. Choose a template and who it's to (their GP, the patient, or someone else) and press Write a letter. Without a note chosen, the latest signed note fills the letter in.

Who it's to

Their GP comes from the practice linked in the patient's details (see Patients' GP practices), with the named GP if they gave one. The patient uses their own address and email. For anyone else, type the name, address and email. The buttons under To fill these in again from the record if the details have changed.

Gaps and guidance

Anything the record doesn't have shows as [missing: …] in the draft, for example a GP practice address. Text in [square brackets] in a template is guidance for you to replace. A letter can't be finished until both are gone, so nothing half-done goes out.

Finished letters

Finishing locks the letter on the patient's record: it can't be changed (write a new one instead), and colleagues who see the patient can open, send and print it. Drafts are only yours until you finish them; you can discard a draft, not a finished letter. Every view, PDF and email is in the access log. Letters are part of the patient's record: they're in a subject access export and are erased with the rest of the record when it's past your retention period.

Your letterhead and signature

The PDF has your logo, clinic name and address at the top (Settings → Branding) and a line in your brand colour. Under the sign-off go your signature, name, title and HCPC number: draw your signature and set your title in Your profile (the menu's photo or initials). The email sent with a letter says only that a letter from your clinic is attached, never who it's about.

Templates

Owners and managers change the templates under Forms & exercises → Letters. A clinic starts with four: a GP letter after an assessment, a referral letter, a discharge letter and a "to whom it may concern" letter. Click a merge field to put it in the letter (patient, clinician, appointment, GP practice, clinic and note); the preview shows a made-up patient. A short line on its own, such as "Findings", prints as a heading; lines starting with "- " print as bullet points. Archiving a template takes it out of the list; letters already written keep their wording.

Who can write letters

Clinicians and the owner, for patients they can see, as with clinical notes. Reception can't, because letters hold clinical details.