Views of Broxbourne residents accessing local GP services heard in new survey
NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care Board (ICB) commissioned Healthwatch Hertfordshire to survey Broxbourne residents to help the local NHS understand their experience of accessing general practice services.
The results of the survey were mixed: most people said the appointments were good but accessing them was more difficult. The survey invited patients to share their experiences, both good and bad, to identify areas for improvement as well as hearing about where general practices were doing well. Positive feedback from patients included GP practices providing appointments when needed, offering support to respondents, and reception staff and healthcare professionals listening and respecting their concerns.
The survey showed that most patients are using the telephone to make appointments with their practice: of these 26% said this was easy while 64% said it was difficult. For most respondents, this was because the phone line was engaged or because they had to wait a long time, sometime for up to an hour, to get through to a receptionist. Respondents do not want to have to rely on the telephone as their only route to access services.
Respondents who used online services to make an appointment with their practice tended to have a more positive experience, with 60% receiving a response either on the same day or the next day.
What happens next?
GP practices continues to be very busy with 52,000 appointments delivered to the nearly 120,000 registered patients in the Broxbourne area in January 2023. The ICB is using the feedback and recommendations from the survey to help improve access to services from patients in the context of this high demand. Recommendations from Healthwatch Hertfordshire included:
- Offering patients different ways of accessing appointments and support including online and in person booking. Enabling online access for patients if this function is not already available.
- Improving telephone systems to reduce delays and waiting times for patients.
- Making more appointments bookable in advance for routine or non-urgent needs.
- Choice of appointments to meet the particular needs of people who work, have caring responsibilities, or who have a disability or a long-term condition.
- Continuing to encourage patients, particularly parents and carers and vulnerable groups, to contact their GP practice if they have concerns about their own health or of those they care for.
- Work with practices to ensure they are promoting themselves effectively to their patients and explaining the different ways in which patients can get in touch.
Hertfordshire and west Essex integrated care board is already taking action to improve access to GP practice and addressing some of the areas identified in the Healthwatch Hertfordshire report.
- The ICB has recently procured a new range of online and video consultation tools. A website review will be undertaken support practices who want it, to standardise the format and content of their practice website to make information more accessible to patients.
- Work to improve phone lines already underway with most practices having been awarded funding to support upgrading their telephone systems. This funding will increase the number of lines into a practice to reduce the answering call times and patients will hear information on where they are in the queue to be answered.
- Support with developing practice patient groups (PPGs). All practices are required to have a patient participation group but the level of involvement varies greatly across practices. A steering group made up of patients, Healthwatch, practice managers and ICB representatives is providing learning and resources to help practices develop their PPGs.
- Assessing patients so that they are seen by the most appropriate professional for their needs. This includes patients with some minor illnesses being given appointments with a community pharmacist instead of a GP. The number of GP practice referrals to community pharmacies are averaging at 1300 per month and the ICB is planning more awareness raising for patients to increase take-up of this service.
Practices are working hard to deliver high quality and timely care their patients in the face of ongoing challenges and pressures arising from a growing, ageing population and a national shortage of clinicians. We’re committed to working with general practice to improve services: understanding patients’ experiences, needs and views is a key part of this work. That is why we commissioned Healthwatch as an impartial organisation to deliver this survey for us and provide us with a report and some recommendations. We are grateful to everyone who took the time to share their views.
Dr Halpin also said: “We want all residents to have the best care possible but unfortunately the survey showed that some respondents felt they couldn’t contact their GP practice because they were concerned about burdening the NHS, worried they wouldn’t get through or assumed they wouldn’t get an appointment. We would like to remind everyone that GP practices are there for you and if you are concerned about an ongoing symptom or would like support to get in touch with your practice. Your GP practice website is often a good place to start.”
This important research has shone a light on the issues facing patients in the Broxbourne area when it comes to accessing GP services. We look forward to seeing what improvements can be made and will be monitoring these to ensure people receive the best possible care.
This is one of a series of surveys that the ICB has commissioned Healthwatch to carry out in support of work to improve patient access to healthcare. We will use these surveys and other feedback from patients alongside any changes in national guidance to ensure we are improving patients’ access to general practice and other services.
If patients have concerns about their practice they should first contact the practice manager and read our advice here. If there are further concerns then it is worth connecting with the patient participation group to make concerns known. If you are unable to resolve your complaint with the practice, please contact NHS England as follows:
0300 311 22 33
For information about primary care services in Hertfordshire and west Essex visit:
https://hertsandwestessex.icb.nhs.uk/local-servcies/general-practice
Downloads
Read the full Report here.
