BNSSG Referral Service
Overview
The BNSSG ICB Referral Service is a referral support service for Bristol and North Somerset and South Gloucestershire. It was formed following the merger of the Bristol CCG Referral Service and North Somerset CCG Referral Service following a review of national evidence about the effectiveness of referral services.
The Referral Service’s main purpose is to support patients and primary care to enable patients to receive the right care by the right person at the right time and place with minimum delays. The service outcomes include:
- Supports patients in making a choice about their provider, receiving the right help to navigate the eRS (formally choose and book) system.
- Supports primary care teams in giving easier access to up to date information on referral pathways for their patients. This includes clinical information and also choice support options. Can troubleshoot referral issues for practices and their patients. Information on referral guidelines and pathways can be found on Remedy
- Supports collaboration between providers (secondary care, community and AQP) and primary care in producing guidelines and pathways of care across BNSSG.
- Collection of referral information from across BNSSG to support efficient use of the existing resources across the ICS.
Referral advice and template
BNSSG Referral Service – Tel: 0117 900 2566
The BNSSG Referral Service is based at 360 Bristol - Three Six Zero, Marlborough Street in Bristol (however, the team is mainly working remotely) 5 days a week, Mon – Fri, 8:30am to 5:00pm.
Email us at BNSSG.Referral.Service@nhs.net
Referral Template
The Referral Service recommend the use of a standard ICB BNSSG Standard Referral Form Template (word version) which is embedded into practice EMIS systems (via Resource Publisher) and will prepopulate with information that is helpful for the triage team and for providers. This information can help improve the patient pathway and is particularly helpful for surgical specialties to help avoid the risk of patients having their treatment cancelled or delayed.
Further advice on pre-operation criteria can be found on the Pre-operative Assessment page.
Useful Guides
Service Guide (link to new location) - please be advised that the Service Guide now has its own page on Remedy to simplify the process of accessing it.
BNSSG GP Practice Guidance - this operational guidance explains how the referral service works and supports practices.
Patient Information Leaflet
The Referral Service have produced a Patient Information leaflet which can be printed and given to patients which explains the referral process and what happens next.
Arabic Patient Information Leaflet
Bengali Patient Information Leaflet
Polish Patient Information Leaflet
Punjabi Patient Information Leaflet
Romanian Patient Information Leaflet
Somali Patient Information Leaflet
Urdu Patient Information Leaflet
BNSSG Patient Transport Leaflet
The patient transport service (PTS) provides planned, non-emergency transport for eligible Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire patients to and from NHS hospitals and clinics, including outpatient departments, inter-hospital transfers, renal dialysis, oncology centres and your home.
It is only available for eligible patients for medical reasons. See the patient leaflet for details.
BNSSG Patient Transport Leaflet
BNSSG Policy Development Team
The BNSSG Policy Development team are responsible for any of the funding policy amendments or the composing of new funding policies. The referral service regularly receive feedback from GP practices about funding policies, or come across problems with funding policies when applying them. The policy team are happy for issues to be sent directly to their email address: