How Can I Correctly Do this Limited Group By Query in MySQL?

Question

I have a query that is returning a list of 25 doctors that needs to reflect their uploaded files (cloud_uploads) in a column. The problem is, I do not want to limit the number of files that are listed, but the limit seems to be applying to the files as well. Other similar questions on SO that I've seen have the opposite problem - they want to limit the files without limiting the total rows returned. I have doctors with more than 25 uploaded files, but the list is only showing the first 25 files rather than all of them.

Because this is a programmatically generated query, I can't separate it into multiple queries. It needs to be one. So, if the answer is that it can't be done, I can accept that.

Here is the current query:

SELECT SQL_CALC_FOUND_ROWS records.instance_id,
        instances.patient_id,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_2) AS field_0,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_1) AS field_1,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_87) AS field_2,
        GROUP_CONCAT(DISTINCT CONCAT (
                        extensible_8_data.field_953,
                        '|||',
                        cloud_uploads.NAME
                        ) SEPARATOR '<br />') AS field_3
FROM form_6_data AS records
LEFT JOIN instances
        ON instances.id = records.instance_id
LEFT JOIN extensible_8_data
        ON records.instance_id = extensible_8_data.instance_id
LEFT JOIN cloud_uploads
        ON extensible_8_data.field_953 = cloud_uploads.id
LEFT JOIN form_1_data
        ON records.field_89 = form_1_data.instance_id
WHERE instances.form_id = 6
        AND instances.active = 1
        AND (
                cloud_uploads.active = 1
                OR cloud_uploads.active IS NULL
                )
GROUP BY records.instance_id
ORDER BY records.instance_id DESC LIMIT 0, 25

Answer 1

Join a subquery that selects the 25 doctors of interest with their files:

SELECT SQL_CALC_FOUND_ROWS records.instance_id,
        instances.patient_id,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_2)  AS field_0,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_1)  AS field_1,
        TRIM(form_1_data.field_87) AS field_2,
        GROUP_CONCAT(DISTINCT CONCAT (
                        extensible_8_data.field_953,
                        '|||',
                        cloud_uploads.NAME
                        ) SEPARATOR '<br />') AS field_3
FROM (SELECT * FROM form_6_data ORDER BY instance_id DESC LIMIT 25) AS records
LEFT JOIN instances
        ON instances.id = records.instance_id
LEFT JOIN extensible_8_data
        ON records.instance_id = extensible_8_data.instance_id
LEFT JOIN cloud_uploads
        ON extensible_8_data.field_953 = cloud_uploads.id
LEFT JOIN form_1_data
        ON records.field_89 = form_1_data.instance_id
WHERE instances.form_id = 6
        AND instances.active = 1
        AND (
                cloud_uploads.active = 1
                OR cloud_uploads.active IS NULL
                )
GROUP BY records.instance_id
ORDER BY records.instance_id