Survey will help shape new extended hours service for GP practices
To help plan longer opening hours for GP practices local people are being asked how the service may look in a patient survey.
Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are preparing plans for all patients to be able to book a regular, routine appointment at a GP practice from 8am to 8pm, Monday to Friday, as well as weekends and Bank Holidays.
These appointments would be with a GP, Nurse, or other clinicians e.g. a Clinical Pharmacist. They may not be at a patient’s own practice, but one nearby and will just be for routine or same-day, pre-bookable appointments, not for urgent or emergency appointments.
A survey is being launched for patients so they can help shape the service. The GP Extended Access Survey is confidential and takes just five minutes to complete. It has 11 multi-choice questions to help the CCGs find out who would be interested in the new extended hours service and when people would be most likely to use it.
The survey also checks how far people would be prepared to travel to appointments and if they would be interested in using different methods for appointments such as Skype.
Dr Stephen James, Clinical Director for Primary Care speaking on behalf of both Shropshire CCG and Telford and Wrekin CCG in this joint project, urged people to complete a survey.
He said: “We will use the findings of the survey to help shape and plan the service so it’s important that people take just take a few minutes to give us some feedback and ideas.
“The patient survey is looking at people’s preferred days and times for appointment over the evenings, weekends, and Bank Holidays.
“We are also looking at practices working in groups, or hubs, so although every practice would not be open for the extended hours, people would not have far to travel to the nearest practice providing this service.”
To take part in the survey visit https://tinyurl.com/Extended-Access-Survey
The survey closes on Friday, 25 May at 5pm and is open to all patients over 16 registered with a practice listed with Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin CCGs.
