General Practice in Norfolk Working relationships with patients and other services part 1
Download (PDF 2.3 MB)Summary of report content
Healthwatch Norfolk decided to explore the relationships between General Practice, patients and other health and social care services in Norfolk. They visited 18 GP practices responsible for providing services to patients from 43 different sites in Norfolk, undertook a survey of 338 patients, conducted one-to-one interviews with 73 members of staff and undertook a further survey of 46 senior primary care staff.
Of the 338 patients who participated in the survey, two thirds (233) had travelled by car to access the GP practice, with little use of community transport. The two most prevalent methods for booking an appointment were by telephone (59%) and in person (30%). The majority (89%) of patients were happy with the service being provided by their GP practice.
Interviews and surveys of practice staff identified problems with IT systems, online booking systems, getting patients to complete the Friends and Family Test, community transport and communicating with other care providers.
There were 5 recommendations to address the problems identified in the report and Healthwatch Norfolk expressed its intention to undertake further work on patient transport and to explore the relationships between different health care services in Norfolk.