Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what recent progress his Department has made on the roll-out of the Cortisone programme to help ensure that those medically discharged from the armed forces receive their medical history documents within one month of leaving.

Programme CORTISONE will collectively link MOD systems with NHS systems in all four home countries, providing the ability for the transfer of a service person's healthcare record in electronic form to a GP practice at the end of their service. This will be available to anyone leaving the services and not just those being medically discharged.

The programme has now delivered a live connection to the NHS, which has been used successfully to transfer COVID-19 vaccination status for service personnel. The next stage of the programme will be the roll-out of connectivity with pilot GP practices which will commence from June 2023.

The Defence Medical Services facilitates the transfer of healthcare information for all service personnel when they leave the Armed Forces. Personnel leaving the Armed Forces are provided with a summary of their medical care, known as an FMed133, and advised to provide this to their NHS General Practitioner (GP) on registration. Personnel are advised to register with an NHS GP one to three months before discharge, and the GP may decide they require a copy of the full Defence Healthcare Record.