When to use NHS consent form 1
Form 1 applies where two things are true at once: the patient is consenting for themselves, and their awareness will be reduced during the procedure.
- Adults aged 16 and over with capacity for this specific decision
- Gillick-competent under-16s consenting to their own treatment
- Procedures involving general anaesthesia, regional block with sedation, or conscious sedation
- Day-case surgery as well as inpatient operations
Where a parent signs for a child who is not competent to decide, the correct document is NHS consent form 2.
What the patient agreement to investigation or treatment must record
The value of NHS consent form 1 sits in the detail written on it, not in the signature at the bottom. Write the procedure in full, including the site and side where that matters.
Record the serious or frequently occurring risks that were actually discussed. Generic phrases like 'usual risks explained' are the single most common weakness found when consent records are reviewed.
- The named procedure, in plain English, with no abbreviations
- The type of anaesthesia or sedation proposed
- Extra procedures the patient agrees to if they become necessary
- Anything the patient specifically refuses
Extra procedures and the unconscious patient
Because the patient cannot be asked once anaesthetised, form 1 asks in advance about procedures that might become necessary. This is where consent form 1 differs most sharply from everyday clinic paperwork.
A common example is a blood transfusion, which some patients decline on religious grounds. If transfusion is likely, take separate consent using a blood transfusion consent form and record the refusal clearly.
Capacity, risk disclosure and Montgomery
Capacity under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 is decision-specific. A patient may have capacity to agree to a scan yet lack it for major surgery on the same admission.
Since Montgomery v Lanarkshire Health Board, the test for risk disclosure is what this patient would consider significant. Note any patient-specific concern — a musician worried about hand function, for example — directly on the form.
Country variants of the adult consent form
Form 1 is a UK document, but each tier-1 health system has an equivalent adult consent record.
United Kingdom
NHS England, NHS Wales, NHS Scotland and HSC Northern Ireland all publish trust-branded versions of consent form 1 with the same four-part structure.
United States
US hospitals use a facility-specific surgical consent document governed by state law — see our surgery consent form for an equivalent layout.
Canada, Australia and New Zealand
Provincial and state health services issue their own operative consent forms, but require the same disclosure of material risks and alternatives.
Confirming consent on the day
Where consent form 1 is signed at a pre-assessment clinic weeks earlier, it must be reconfirmed on the day of admission. The template includes a confirmation block for exactly this.
Reconfirmation is not a new signature for its own sake. It is a short check that nothing has changed and that the patient still has no unanswered questions before theatre.