Hold the phone
Released 04/03/2011
Can practices afford to hang up on patients?
Call centres have been at the centre of a heated debate in the health sector for the past few weeks, ever since the government put forward plans to centralise practices' telephone services to national call centres (despite originally saying they wouldn't).
Critics have been furious - seeing it as no way to treat patients, with the Family Doctor Association calling it "morally wrong". Now practice managers have spoken up in a recent survey, with a vast majority agreeing with the FDA. For them, the phone is one of their main points of contacts with their patients - without it they fear losing touch with those that matter most in a changing NHS.
The idea of taking phone bookings away from local GPs seems contradictory to what the Department of Health is trying to achieve with the health bill. If the bill passes, it will be up to the consortia to do what they want (with checks from the NHS Commissioning Board and Monitor), including, certainly how they take their appointments.
The level of concern among folks in the primary care community over what they will be told they can and can't do around call centres speaks of an out-dated mind-set that still sees the government as a main source of guidance. The beauty of the reforms (and yes, the practice managers I've been speaking to see beauty) is the power to listen to patients and make commissioning decisions based on what they say.
I mention it in my comment in March's Practice Business, however, I can't stop thinking of what Geraldine Taggart-Jeewa, a practice manager at North Meols Medical Centre in Southport who is also on the committee for the FDA and Practice Managers Network, called herself: a frontline manager. Not only do practice managers have the skills to manage a busy practice, but they know their patients too. They see them in the waiting room; they get to know their repeat visitors and are pivotal in setting up patient groups. Communication is central to this. It's no wonder call centres put them on edge. It's a major part of the surgery's relationship with their patient.
It's a strange time - a time when the DH is demanding better care for patients, preparing to hand over £80bn of NHS money to GPs, and yet consortia are expected to save the NHS a quarter of that. Efficiencies are essential, and every practice manager knows that better than anyone, but they cannot be at the cost of the patients - and boy, do practice managers know that.