On Mon, 07 Jul 2014 10:33:09 +0100, Tony Coombe <tony_coombe@btinternet.com> wrote: > The simple answer is no. And the more complex answer is ... > Originally the NHS number was the war time National Registration Number > which had numerous forms and mixtures of letters and numbers and > occasionally forward slashes, which sometimes showed family > relationships, and were sometimes not unique. These were replaced in the > 1990s with a ten digit number that is supposedly unique and is now > issued at birth registration. This includes a check digit to ensure > validity of the whole number. There is no "hidden" information that can > be extracted from the number itself. Between rhe war time allocations and 'some later time' then they do have some utility - mine is MCFO 256 which tells me my birth is registered as entry 256 in book MCFO which is allocated to margate (or Thanet, I don't recall what the district was then). > It is no more than a unique identifier. At heart, yes, but for some post-war period, knowledge of someone's NHS number gives a key into the local registrars birth registers. -- Malcolm Austen <malcolm.austen@weald.org.uk> GENUKI trustee <genuki@weald.org.uk> Pedigree User Group <chairman@pugweb.org.uk> Oxfordshire FHS <webmaster@ofhs.org.uk> FFHS Communications Officer <communications@ffhs.org.uk>