Diagnoses in discharge communications: How far are they reliable?

To discover whether general practitioners are correctly notified of a patie nt's final diagnosis following hospital discharge, an observational study w as undertaken in a district general hospital. The final diagnosis was compa red with the diagnosis documented in the discharge summary and the take-hom e prescription. Two hundred discharges were studied. Only 163 (81%) dischar ge summaries and 138 (69%) take-home prescriptions had the correct diagnosi s; 24 (12%) take-home prescriptions did not have any diagnosis at all. In s ome cases the diagnosis differed between the discharge summaries and the ta ke-home prescriptions. Only in 122 (61%) cases was the final diagnosis corr ectly documented in both instances. Communication regarding diagnosis in di scharge letters is less than adequate. Every effort should be made to impro ve this.