NEC have established a weekly scan-on-demand service for the practices for whom they store paper medical records. All practices involved should now be using this service.

Records are requested electronically by the practice and then are scanned by NEC and uploaded to the Rego secure cloud-based storage system as pdf files. Practices can then access Rego to download the files and they can then add them to the patient record as attachments.

If a patient deduction request is received by a practice, it is advised that the full NEC scan and download process is completed before finalising the deduction (by PCSE or GP2GP). This ensures that the complete digital record will always be part of the SystmOne or EMIS patient record.
If the system is not working for any practices, please do let us know.

The next stage is for NEC to index all the records that they are holding for Lincolnshire practices. NEC inherited the records from Scanhouse in varying states of (dis)organisation and so the ICB have funded a project to create an up-to-date database of exactly what records are stored and exactly where. This will take a few weeks to complete but will improve the speed and accuracy of the service and identify where any records may have been lost or misfiled.

Many practices have asked what is happening regarding getting newly registered patient notes added to the NEC store? The bankruptcy of Scanhouse and the subsequent ICB-funded “rescue mission” by NEC means that we have effectively paid double our budgeted amount for storage in this financial year. As a result, there is no funding for adding new records to the existing practice records at NEC until next financial year. We are very sorry that this financial limitation will create some inconvenience for practices over the coming months. If this impacts on the ability to provide patient services for any practice, please do contact us and we will try to assist. We intend to incorporate the collection of new registration records from practices as part of our 2024/5 records storage contract.

The current financial situation at the ICB also means that we are unable to consider any new practices joining the NEC service at this time. If the storage of paper records is impacting on a practice’s ability to work, please do let us know so that we can try and work with you to find possible solutions.