A leading expert on GP services published a major report emphasising that the best way to improve patient care, increase efficiency and improve value for money is to adopt Government reforms moving more care closer to patients’ homes into GPs’ surgeries, health centres and community hospitals.
In a series of recommendations to Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt, the Government’s GP ‘tsar’, Dr David Colin-Thome, makes the clinical case for widening the role of family doctors to include services traditionally only found in hospitals.
Dr Colin-Thome advises that family doctors with accredited specialist skills should handle more minor operations. His report recommends that it becomes routine for specially trained GPs and senior consultants to work together in cottage hospitals and health centres.
He argues NHS patients would benefit from a one-stop service, where GPs could refer patients to consultants who are literally down the corridor. Operations like cataracts, hernia and varicose veins could be done on the same site, reducing waiting times and saving money.
The report also suggests GPs should take responsibility for the traditional six-week post-surgery check-up from hospital consultants. Some hospitals work in this way , why not all? Dr Colin-Thome believes that this approach would free-up consultants’ time to see patients with more serious conditions, and if applied also to other routine check ups could deliver huge savings for the NHS every year.
National Clinical Director for Primary Care, Dr David Colin-Thome, said:
“Patients trust GPs. We’re highly trained, offer high quality cost-effective services and our communities respect us, so why aren’t we doing even more?
“Our training allows us to spot the first signs of cancer, give advice on weight loss and deal with depression and desperation. Many of us specialise in particular aspects of medicine and the nurses, midwives and pharmacists we work with have similar skills which the public value.
“Expanding the services GPs, nurses, midwives, pharmacists and other key staff such as physiotherapists provide in our communities and homes makes sense. And economically, it makes sense.
“The evolution of GP services is about adding and improving, not cutting and rationing services. It is designed to take the pressure off hospitals and recognises that 21st century hospitals should be centres of excellence, but only for care that has to be delivered there – emergency and core specialist services. It allows us to give patients what they want – personal care closer to home.”