Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 13
13
NHSE&I asked GPs and hospital doctors to add or remove people from the list, based...
Conclusion
NHSE&I asked GPs and hospital doctors to add or remove people from the list, based on their clinical judgement, and as their patients’ conditions or treatments changed over time.26 However, the extent to which the list grew between 12 April and 15 May 2020 varied hugely in different areas, with increases in the list ranging from 15% in Carlisle to 352% in Hounslow, with an average increase across local authorities of 73%. This was not a small number of authorities with variance from the average 73%: 33 authorities saw their list sizes more than double between these dates, whereas 17 saw their list sizes increase by less than a third over the same period.27
Government Response
Not Addressed
HM Government
Not Addressed
3: PAC conclusion: Huge local variation strongly suggests that GPs were inconsistent when judging who was clinically extremely vulnerable and should therefore be advised to shield and be eligible for support. 3: PAC recommendation: Within six months, DHSC and NHS Digital should provide to the Committee a detailed explanation for the local variation in growth for the shielded patient list between April and May 2020 including the extent it was due to appropriate clinical judgements and identify lessons for how to support a consistent clinical approach in future. 3.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: October 2021 3.2 Whilst the government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation, it does not agree with the conclusion that there was huge local variation. NHS Digital and DHSC have already written to the Committee with an initial analysis of the local variation in growth of the Shielded Patient List (SPL). This found that most areas fell within the expected distribution, although it is acknowledged that six local areas did add more people to the SPL than the department would have expected. 3.3 NHS Digital and DHSC will conduct further analysis to understand in more detail the drivers of this local variation and identify lessons for the future. DHSC and NHS Digital will write to the Committee setting out these findings by October 2021.