Each month GPs, nurse practitioners and hospital doctors complete about 2,300 Medical Certificates of Cause of Death and Cremation Certificates.
The Ministry of Health and the Department of Internal Affairs partnered to develop Death Documents, an online service which allows doctors and nurse practitioners to complete these forms online.
The process can now be entirely paperless because funeral directors can pick up the forms online, allowing them to progress the funeral arrangements faster for the family.
All you need to get started is a RealMe login (just a username and password) and your council number or CPN. If you don't already have a RealMe login, you can create one as you register for Death Documents in less than 5 minutes.
Practitioners with a verified RealMe (where you've had your photo taken online or at a post shop to confirm your RealMe identity) can also draw down patient information from the NHI database to pre-populate the forms.
Practitioners using this additional feature are reporting it takes less time to complete the forms on line than it did on paper, with less errors.
Dates of death can be assigned to NHI records much faster, reducing the chance of deceased people being invited to attend health services.
Features are being added continuously and death certification guidance on the Ministry of Health website has been refreshed.
If you haven't heard about it, or you are using it but haven't worked out how to get access to the NHI to pre-populate the patient details, visit the Death Documents website or email deathdocs@dia.govt.nz for more help.
Duplicate certificates
An alert will appear if a certifier creates a new document for an NHI number that matches the NHI number on a document that has already been submitted, or is in draft. The certifier can view the document that has already been created or continue to create a new one as long as a reason is entered.
Amending old certificates
There are no longer any date restrictions on the date of death when creating or amending certificates. However, a warning will be returned if the date of death is more than one week earlier than the current date.
Date last seen alive
A certifier who was not the attending practitioner can now enter the "Date last seen alive", however this is optional. The entry "N/A" will no longer be printed on the form.
Default settings for question related to pregnancy
The question "Was the deceased pregnant at the time of death?” will be defaulted to "No" if the deceased is outside the usual age range for pregnancy. This can be changed to "Yes" where applicable.
Upcoming changes
The Death Documents team is currently working on additional enhancements which are expected to be released by the end of June this year.
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