Source · Select Committees · Health and Social Care Committee
Recommendation 31
31
Accepted
Paragraph: 110
Unacceptable patient uncertainty accessing first-contact care through new NHS organisations.
Conclusion
Primary Care Networks and Integrated Care Systems offer an opportunity to better integrate care around people. It should not be the case that patients face so much uncertainty about where to turn to if they have a new or urgent care need and it is particularly unacceptable if the number of different organisations involved in providing first-contact services to patients makes it harder to patients to access the care they need. It is welcome that Dr Claire Fuller’s review for NHS England has made this a priority.
Government Response Summary
The government accepts the recommendation for better integrated care, stating NHS England has issued a framework to support access, implemented the Modern General Practice Access approach, begun commercial work to rationalise digital services, and started standardising patient communications.
Paragraph Reference:
110
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
Accept. The Department accepts this recommendation and agrees that this should be a priority for Integrated Care Systems. NHS England have already issued a framework to support conversations between Integrated Care System teams and GP practices or Primary Care Networks, to assess where additional support may be required to improve patient access. The ways patients can access general practice has changed, with increased use of triage to prioritise care appropriately, and remote consultations. It is important that patients are supported to access and navigate general practice services, and are not dissuaded from seeking care. The Modern General Practice Access approach from the Delivery Plan for Recovering Access to Primary Care puts an emphasis on better navigating patients and assessing the clinical need of all patients. Clinically urgent requests should be assessed on the same day, and when the request is not urgent, an appointment, if needed, should be scheduled within two weeks. NHS England has begun commercial work to support the rationalisation of patient-facing digital services for general practice, as well as on user research and guidance to support improvements to general practice websites and online consultation systems. NHS England also has started work to increase standardisation of language and communications to use with patients to help simplify their experience when making contact with general practice services.