Hundreds of children may have missed jabs in NHS blunder

350,000 errors found in records

HUNDREDS of parents may not have been informed their children were due for vaccinations because of an NHS records error, the M.E.N. can reveal.

As NHS staff tried to transfer health records for youngsters in Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, and Trafford to a new computer system they discovered 350,000 errors.

Bosses of Pennine Care, which provides children’s health services in these areas, have launched an investigation and set up a helpline for concerned parents.

A spokeswoman said they do not believe any children have been harmed because of the errors, which they say could range from failing to call youngsters for vaccinations to simply incomplete contact information.

One source said: “It could mean that children have not had their full course of vaccinations and children may not have had visits from health visitors they were due.

“This has arisen because people have not had the proper training to do data coding.”

The records were acquired by Pennine from other organisations in Bury, Oldham, and Rochdale in 2011 and from Trafford in 2013. But they date back more than a decade.

The computer system which the Trust is trying to replace is CCH2000 which is used at many NHS trusts across the country.

Pennine Care want to replace it with a more robust system after using it for six years.

In a joint statement with the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership, they said: “Pennine Care is currently working on plans to transfer the child health data from CCH2000 to a new and improved system called Paris, which is already used by other clinical services across the trust.

“During the process of transferring the data from CCH2000 to Paris, the trust has found the old system contains a number of data issues. It is too soon to fully confirm what the data issues are, but they could range from names and addresses being incorrect or potentially vaccinations being recorded incorrectly.

“Pennine Care, GMHSC Partnership and commissioners are working closely together to determine what impact, if any, the data inaccuracies have had on the scheduling of child vaccinations. Urgent work is being undertaken to cleanse the data as much as possible in order to provide a clear understanding of what the implications are.

“Clinical staff will still be administering vaccinations safely and in line with national guidelines. There is no reason to suggest there are any problems with how vaccinations have been administered or a risk of harm to patients. The problem relates to how they have been recorded on an electronic system and subsequently scheduled. However, please be assured that GPs hold children’s full immunisation and vaccination records.

“Whilst parents may be concerned, we would like to provide reassurance that this problem is being treated with utmost urgency. If any errors relating to the scheduling of vaccinations are found, parents will be fully informed at the earliest opportunity.

“Parents are advised to continue attending scheduled vaccination appointments, which will still carry on during this process.”

It could mean that children have not had their full course of vaccinations Pennine Care source