OET Transfer Letter: Structure, Content and Common Mistakes

Transfer tasks appear less often in OET than referrals or discharges, but they present a specific challenge: candidates who prepare mostly for discharges often apply discharge logic to a transfer and lose Content marks as a result. The difference is clinical responsibility. In a discharge, you are ending it. In a transfer, you are passing it on.

What makes a transfer different

A referral asks a specialist to assess and advise. A discharge returns the patient to community care. A transfer moves the patient to a facility that will continue active treatment.

The receiving team is not starting a new episode from the beginning. They are picking up where you stopped. They need to know:

• What was being done
• Why it was being done
• What has changed or is still in progress
• What they need to do next

This is why transfer letters often need more clinical detail than discharges. The receiving clinician is stepping into the middle of a care episode, not receiving a summary of a completed one.

Structure of an OET transfer letter

Opening: purpose and destination

One sentence states the transfer, the patient, and the destination. Add one sentence giving the condition and event that prompted the admission or the need for transfer.

“I am writing to arrange the transfer of Michael Osei, 67, to your sub-acute rehabilitation unit, where he will continue his recovery following a right femoral neck fracture repaired by hemiarthroplasty on 28 May 2026.”

Current clinical status

This is the most important section for the receiving team. They need to know where the patient is clinically right now, not how they arrived at this point.

Include:

• Weight-bearing status and mobility
• Pain management
• Wound status if surgical
• Neurological status if relevant
• Cognitive status if the patient is being transferred to a facility that needs to assess care capacity

Do not reproduce the full admission history here. The receiving team does not need the chronology of the acute episode; they need the current platform from which they will work.

Relevant history

A brief, focused summary of the history relevant to ongoing management. For the patient above, this would include previous mobility baseline, relevant comorbidities affecting rehabilitation (e.g. diabetes affecting wound healing, prior cardiac conditions affecting exercise tolerance), and anything that changes the safe parameters for rehabilitation.

Ongoing management plan

This is where transfer letters differ most clearly from discharge letters.

In a discharge letter: “She has been prescribed omeprazole 20mg daily and should follow up with her GP in two weeks.”

In a transfer letter: “The rehabilitation team should continue the post-operative hip precautions protocol, targeting 90-degree hip flexion limit for a minimum of six weeks from the date of surgery. Weight-bearing as tolerated with a frame, supervised by physiotherapy, commenced on post-operative day two. Pain management is currently managed with paracetamol 1g QID and oxycodone 5mg PRN, with review of opioid requirement at day 14.”

The transfer letter specifies what the receiving team should continue and at what parameters, not what the patient should do at home.

Outstanding items

Anything pending that the receiving team needs to act on or monitor:

• Blood results not yet back
• Wound review scheduled
• Specialist appointments pending
• Medication changes under review

These are a Content requirement. Leaving the receiving team unaware of outstanding items creates a clinical gap.

Closing

State any transfer-specific logistics the task prompts (transport requirements, equipment, escort) and close with a contact invitation.

“Please do not hesitate to contact me should you require any further information regarding his clinical history or current management.”

Common mistakes in transfer letters

Writing “follow-up with GP” for active conditions. The patient is transferring to an inpatient or residential facility, not going home. Recommending GP review for conditions that the receiving team is responsible for managing is a Content error. It reflects discharge thinking applied to a transfer task.

Omitting the management plan entirely. Some candidates describe the acute episode in detail and then simply state that the patient “requires ongoing rehabilitation.” What rehabilitation, at what intensity, with what precautions, is the information the receiving team is waiting for.

Giving too much history. Transfer letters, like all OET letters, are scored on Content and Conciseness together. A complete transfer of clinical responsibility does not require every piece of historical information. It requires the information that affects ongoing management.

For the full set of OET letter types and how they compare, see OET letter types compared. The OET writing criteria covers how Content and Organisation and Layout are scored across all letter types.