Patients Association releases research on out of hours care
The Patients Association has released information obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and analysis of the unweighted results of the National GP Patient Survey quarters 1 and 2 2009/10 of over a million patients which highlighted wide variations in spending and reveals a league table of poor patient satisfaction with out of hours care.
FOI results from 90 Trusts reveal that the average spend per head of the registered patient population was £9.00 but there was significant variation with the lowest spending less than £1.50 and the highest over £20.00.
Director of the Patients Association Katherine Murphy said “These figures aren’t an exact science. There will be some PCTs that didn’t do a very good job of negotiating their contracts or calculating what the service really costs them. Some PCTs will have large rural populations which can be more expensive. But common sense would tell you that this degree of variation is worrying - it is hard to understand how one PCT might be spending 16 times more on out of hours care than another. Similar variations were also found in research conducted by the Primary Care Foundation. It is vital that the Department of Health press on with reform in this area so we can have a much better idea of what service is being provided for what money. Participation in benchmarking must be mandatory and the results published as soon as possible. Then we’ll be more able to say what value for money is and when PCTs are scrimping on such a vital service. Local scrutiny is only effective if you know how well your local services are performing.”
Analysis of the results of the GP National Patient survey reveals that for the first two quarters of 2009/10 that in over a fifth of Trusts (33) 1 in 6 patients rate out of hours care as either poor or very poor. This represents an increase from the 2008/2009 results (30) though comparisons are limited due to different survey methodologies.
PA Director Katherine Murphy said “Once again, there is huge variation with more than double the number of patients rating the service as poor or very poor at the bottom of the table compared to the top. This is completely unacceptable. The postcode lottery of care has to stop.”
The Patients Association also asked Primary Care Trusts to tell us how many complaints their providers had received and how many Serious Untoward Incidents (SUIs) there had been related to out of hours care. 5 Trusts were unable to tell us how many complaints there had been and 3 were unable to tell us how many SUIs there had been.
PA Director Katherine Murphy said “This is appalling. If you are paying for a service for patients surely the most important thing you should be doing is monitoring when people aren’t happy with the service. Every Trust should have this information readily available” she added.
For more information, to arrange interviews and to receive a breakdown of the research please contact the Patients Association on 0208 423 9111 or mailbox@patients-association.com.
If you would like to share your experience of out of hours care, good or bad, please contact our Helpline on helpline@patients-association.com or 0845 608 4455.
