A coroner has asked hospital doctors to have electronic access to primary care medical notes following the death of a four-year-old boy in Nottingham.
Akhona Moyo, autistic and non-verbal, died from a brain tumor on 26 November 2022 at Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham.
in a future death prevention reportdated January 28, 2026, Hassan Shah, assistant coroner for Northamptonshire, said Moyo could have survived if he had been admitted to hospital and received a scan earlier, and “received earlier intervention aimed at reducing intracranial pressure”.
Shah said hospital doctors did not have electronic access to primary care medical notes, including GP and community mental health notes.
“All doctors who testified at the inquiry stated that access to primary care records would certainly help them provide better treatment and care to patients.
“Access to such information was considered particularly important in cases such as the current one, when a patient is autistic and non-verbal.
“There may be many other reasons why a patient or family may not be able to convey a complete and accurate medical history to doctors,” Shah said.
He added that access to GP notes can allow doctors to have “a more holistic view of a patient’s medical condition” rather than “working in silos”.
Hemant Nemade, medical director of Northamptonshire University Hospitals Group, said Digital health news: “We offer our deepest condolences to Akhona’s family and loved ones.
“We deeply regret not having offered an earlier scan to affect this tragic outcome. “This is a very sad case and we recognize the profound impact it has had on Akhona’s family.
“A significant program of work is underway across our hospitals to ensure that learning from this case is fully understood and translated into significant improvements in patient care, so that we reduce the risk of this happening again.”
Northampton General Hospital went live with a Nervecentre EPR in June 2025.
In the coroner’s report, Shah says the EPR “contains only hospital notes”, adding that “hospital doctors also have access to the Northamptonshire Care Record, which contains basic lists of GP visits and medication, but no detailed entries.”
However, a spokesperson for nervous center said Digital health news that the EPR gained GP Connect accreditation in 2021, allowing hospital doctors to “view GP patient records in real time alongside other information in Nervecentre, supporting safer care by providing complete visibility into patient history at the point of care”.
“GP Connect is a national service that is available to all NHS trusts using Nervecentre.
“Northampton General Hospital began using Nervecentre in 2025, and GP Connect is heavily used by its doctors, accessing primary care records around 2,500 times a day from Nervecentre GP Connect pages,” the spokesperson said.
Northampton General Hospital, the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England have until March 24, 2026 to respond to the coroner’s report with “details of any action taken or proposed to be taken”.
