Continuity of care: delayed diagnosis in GP practices

From the investigation: Continuity of care: delayed diagnosis in GP practices

Recommendation date:

Safety recommendation

HSSIB recommends that the Department of Health and Social Care ensures that the GP contract explicitly includes and supports the need for GP practices to deliver continuity of care. This is to improve patient safety by building clinician–patient relationships as well as providing continuity of information.

Response:

This Government has committed to bring back the family doctor so patients can see the same doctor at each appointment. This is what patients and doctors want, and what the evidence says is best for patient care and can improve efficiency and productivity.

Doing so will be achieved by incentivising GPs to see the same patients, so ongoing or complex conditions are dealt with effectively. We will work with the profession and engage stakeholders to inform how this is delivered.

The 2024/25 GP contract explicitly requires continuity of care to be considered when determining the appropriate response when a patient contacts their practice. We will consider how to best use the GP contract to embed continuity in future years.

There are other wider enablers, beyond the contract, that we will leverage to drive improvements in the provision of continuity of care. For instance, building capacity in general practice by training thousands more GPs; guaranteeing face-to-face appointments for all those who want one; delivering a modern appointment booking system; and shifting resources to primary and community care services.

We welcome this report and thank the HSSIB for highlighting this issue. We look forward to working with the profession and stakeholders to bring back the family doctor.

Actions planned to deliver safety recommendation:

  1. Explore how the GP contract can embed continuity. By: on-going.
  2. Explore incentivisation of continuity of care. By: on-going.
  3. Engage the profession and stakeholders on bringing back the family doctor and the approach to incentivising GPs to see the same patients so ongoing or complex conditions are dealt with effectively. By: Summer/Autumn 2024.

Response received on 3 September 2024.

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