How Can you register with a GP, without knowing your NHS number?

becky_rtw

Sorry to not be more help. Hope he gets his vaccine sorted even if it takes a little while. 

cannugec5

becky_rtw said:

He may have to go a surgery further afield if the local won't do it.
I didn't use mine when I registered at my GPS. 

He is not concerned about the distance. He has friends who have traveled far and wide to get the jab. 

I just don’t want him to miss this chance. 

jamesd

The NHS number was introduced in 1996 so he may never have been issued with one. I wasn't and just directly approached a practice without online form filling. They took care of getting one issued.  The NHS formally says that you can register without one. The online forms are for the majority, he just needs to skip that and phone to ask how to achieve it. Some paper form or dummy number, most likely. If the practice still refuses, NHS advice is to contact the NHS directly about it.

He's not the only one put off by the apparent but not real requirement, I was as well.

elsien

According to this he doesn’t need an NHS number to register.
There’s also an NHS England number if he continues to have difficulty.
https://www.nhs.uk/nhs-services/gps/how-to-register-with-a-gp-surgery/

cannugec5

Thank you all. I have just fed all that back to him. It is very helpful to hear that he is not the only one to be put off by onerous form filling, and indeed that the magic number is not even necessary. 

josephine82

GPs have to be able to register patients without an NHS number because they have to do this all the time for babies, and people who move to the country and register for the first time. 

When the GP practice registers him, his details will be checked with the central database for patient registrations and then if he has an existing number they will provide it. If not they will give a new number.  I would go back to the GP and ask them to register him again. 

Context, I work on a research project where I’ve had to become very familiar with the way patients are registered at their GP practice!!!!!! 

silvercar

I suspect some surgeries are using a lack of NHS number as a selection process!

I’ve been volunteering on the vaccine programme and was recently at an inner city GP surgery. After reading this thread I asked if they would register a patient without an NHS number, they laughed and said they register patients without a fixed address; a patient knowing their NHS number and having a current registration at a GP surgery elsewhere would be a novelty.

t0rt0ise

If the receptionist won't register without the NHS number, contact the Practice Manager. Look at the practice website for names etc.

olgadapolga

josephine82 said:

GPs have to be able to register patients without an NHS number because they have to do this all the time for babies

Babies born in the UK have their own NHS number from when they are born  (or rather as soon as the midwife enters the birth into the hospital computer system). I used to work as a midwife and the NHS number was always generated in this way.