For GPs and referrers

Referrals, and what helps them move quickly.

Referrals to Oxford Men’s Health are accepted by email or by telephone, and no proforma is required. Four presentations are emergencies rather than referrals, and are set out below. Including the items below usually removes one appointment from the pathway, because the first consultation can then end in a plan rather than in a request for results.

How to refer

By email to admin@oxfordmenshealth.uk, or by telephone on 01865 307733. A letter is welcome but not required — a few lines are enough to start.

Insured and self-funding patients are both accepted, and self-funding patients may be seen without a referral where they prefer. You will receive a letter after the consultation setting out the findings and the plan.

Send a referral → The evidence appraisals

Seen the same week

A catheter in situ after retention
Visible haematuria
A suspected testicular mass
An infected or eroded prosthetic device — the emergency department first if the patient is systemically unwell

Telephone rather than email for these, and the patient will be given an appointment the same week wherever possible.

Emergencies — not a referral

These need the emergency department now, or 999. This practice cannot provide emergency care and its lines are not monitored out of hours. Once the emergency has been dealt with, the follow-up is welcome here.

A painful erection lasting more than three to four hours — priapism — or more than one hour in a man with sickle cell disease. Permanent damage to the penis follows if it is not treated quickly.
Sudden severe pain in a testicle, testicular pain with nausea, vomiting or abdominal pain, or pain lasting more than an hour or continuing at rest. Torsion until proven otherwise; the testicle is lost if it is not treated within hours.
Unable to pass urine at all — same-day catheterisation, through the emergency department or the acute urology service. A catheter already in place is a same-week referral, above.
Stone pain with a fever — an obstructed, infected kidney until proven otherwise, needing drainage the same day rather than antibiotics and a wait.

Thresholds as in NHS guidance on priapism and testicle pain.

What helps most

PSA with its date, and any previous values
Recent renal function and urinalysis
Current medication, including anticoagulants
Previous urological procedures, with operative notes if held
Any imaging already performed, with the report

Advice, without a referral

If you would rather ask than refer — an equivocal PSA, a scan you are unsure how to act on, a man on tamsulosin who is no better, or simply whether someone needs seeing at all — email advice@oxfordmenshealth.uk. That address reaches me rather than the appointments team, and a question is often the quicker answer for your patient than a referral.

Not for anything urgent — telephone instead. Please send patient-identifiable detail only from a secure address.

Referrals in brief

Referrals to admin@oxfordmenshealth.uk or by telephone; no proforma is needed. Clinical questions, without a referral, to advice@oxfordmenshealth.uk, which reaches me rather than the appointments team. Insured and self-funding patients are both accepted, and the list of what helps most is in the first box on this row. The condition pages below set out what each area offers, with the evidence.

Referrals, and what helps them move quickly.

How to refer

Seen the same week

Emergencies — not a referral

Six areas, each with a page of its own.