SQL query - Join that returns the first two records of joining table

Question

I have two tables:

Patient

• pkPatientId
• FirstName
• Surname

PatientStatus

• pk

Answer 1

Here is how I would approach this:

-- Patients with at least 2 status records
with PatientsWithEnoughRecords as (
    select fkPatientId
        from PatientStatus as ps
        group by 
            fkPatientId
        having
            count(*) >= 2
)
select top 2 *
    from PatientsWithEnoughRecords as er 
        left join PatientStatus as ps on
            er.fkPatientId = ps.fkPatientId
    order by StartDate asc

I am not sure what determines the "first" two status records in your case, so I assumed you want the earliest two StartDate**s. Modify the last **order by clause to get the records that you are interested in.

Edit: SQL Server 2000 doesn't support CTEs, so this solution will indeed only work directly on 2005 and later.