Minimum Referral Requirements

In order for our staff to accurately triage your referral and to make sure all necessary reports and clinical information is immediately available to the clinician when the patient is seen, we request the following as a minimum referral standard:

• Must be addressed to the Department of Nephrology, Royal Children’s Hospital.
• Name, address and phone number of the patient.
• Name, provider number, direct phone number and location of the referrer.
• Formal reports of all blood tests, urine tests and ultrasound reports.
  • Remember that the information provided in the referral is usually all the information that the treating nephrologist will have when the patient is seen. Without formal reports, we are unable to provide advice.

Referrals not meeting this minimum standard will be rejected and the patient returned to the care of the referrer.

Referrals from Public Hospitals

Must include:

• the name and contact details of the supervising Consultant responsible for the referral (including all referrals made in alignment with Clinical Practice Guidelines).
  • This is to ensure that any correspondence in response to the referral (particularly if it is rejected) is directed to a permanent member of staff.
• the patient’s GP details. 

Please do not:

• enter your hospital switchboard phone number as your phone number.
  • If further information is required to accurately triage the referral and we cannot contact you directly, the referral will be rejected.
• assume that the doctor that is triaging your referral and/or seeing the patient in clinic knows about the discussions you’ve had with other members of our team.
  • Referrals containing "as discussed with renal fellow/Dr X..." without sufficient be rejected.

Referrals Requiring Reassessment

Emergencies

Referrals requiring urgent re-assessment should be directed to their local Emergency Department.

Non-urgent

Supervision of patients waiting to be seen remain the responsibility of the referring clinician. If you feel a referred patient’s urgency has changed, a new referral should be made and should be retriaged.

In addition to the minimum referral requirements above, the new referral must contain the following information:

• The referral must state that the referrer is requesting an expedited assessment of the patient due to a change in the clinical picture (without this, the referral will be discarded as a renewal or duplicate referral)
• Date of the original referral
• Reason for requesting a review of the referral (e.g. deterioration in clinical condition, pathology, ultrasound)

We are happy to speak to you if you have concerns or need interim management advice regarding a patient on our wait list who you are concerned about. Please contact the department.

Prereferral Guidelines

The following pre-referral guidelines have been designed by our team to assist referrers to provide sufficient information at first referral for accurate triage, and to assist referrers in the interim monitoring or management of common low acuity conditions whilst awaiting specialist appointments.

Referrals not meeting minimum criteria according to our referral guidelines will be returned the to the referrer.

Duplex Kidney

Haematuria

Hypertension

Kidney Stone Prevention

Multicystic Dysplastic Kidney (MCDK)

Isolated Proteinuria/Albuminuria

Solitary Kidney