Checking if Post Title is Unique as Loop Criteria

In case anyone’s wondering I managed to get this fixed with a pointer about using var_dump(). Here’s the modified loop.

function build_home_id ($pcode_id, $assigned_id_no) {

//$cmplt_id = $pcode_id . "-" . number_pad($assigned_id_no, 3);  // Gets postcode string and calls the number padding function to add the leading 0's

do {
        $cmplt_id = $pcode_id . "-" . number_pad($assigned_id_no, 3);  // Gets postcode string and calls the number padding function to add the leading 0's
        $assigned_id_no++; // Increase assigned_id_no
        $existing = get_page_by_title($cmplt_id, OBJECT, "patient");
        $existing_post = $existing->post_title;
}
    while($cmplt_id == $existing_post);    // Restart loop if built id matches any already in existance
    return $cmplt_id;

}

The problem is the get_page_by_title() returns an object not a string. Hope this helps someone.