Superseded PDS Records

Overview

A superseded PDS record scenario can only ever arise when Medicus requests the PDS record for a patient with an existing local patient record and the response contains a different NHS number to the one held against the patient record.

This means that the scenario can never arise after the user has conducted a PDS search to initiate a workflow.

NHS Digital provides the following guidance about superseded records for system suppliers:

Some patients are marked as superseded, this means that for some reason the original resource is no longer valid and has been replaced with a different resource.

On retrieval of a superseded resource, the new resource is automatically returned in place of the requested resource. You can spot a superseded resource when the id is not the same as the one requested.

When retrieving a superseding resource you must update your system with the new resource and remove the superseded resource, ensuring that the same id does not exist against another resource in your system.

Source: Personal Demographics Service - FHIR API - NHS Digital

Handling Superseded Records in Medicus

If Medicus retrieves a superseded PDS record, it firsts check whether there is another patient record in the system that matches the NHS number returned in the response.

If there is no local patient record with that NHS number, it updates the patient’s NHS number, creates a new PDS Link with a status of active for the new NHS number and then sets the old PDS Link to superseded which means that it will no longer try to synchronise the local record with the PDS using that NHS number anymore.

If there is a local patient record with the new NHS number already, the PDS link status is still updated to superseded but no new PDS link is created. This is because Medicus has detected a duplicate record. In this scenario, no further synchronisation between Medicus and the PDS will take place but the existing local record will still be usable.

A superseded PDS record task is then created so that you are aware of the issue.

This scenario is very rare but if it does happen, simply contact Medicus support and we will help to resolve the issue of the duplicate records.