GP extended hours and out of hours report
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Healthwatch Cheshire East and Healthwatch Cheshire West undertake continuous engagement activities with the public to hear about concerns and compliments regarding health and social care services. In April and May of 2017, they conducted a priorities survey to establish what people felt were their key areas of concern relating to health and social care services for our year ahead. A common issue raised by people around their NHS services is that they struggle to obtain GP appointments and use services at a time that suits them. In order to help address this, recent years have seen the introduction of Extended Hours services to offer appointments and services outside of core contracted hours, and also of Out of Hours services which are designed to provide people with treatment if they attempt to call their GP outside of the core hours. In order to explore themes emerging from the comments we received regarding difficulties obtaining appointments, they decided to undertake a survey to gain an idea of people’s experiences and awareness of GP Extended Hours and Out of Hours services.
To gain an insight into people’s awareness and experience of using Extended Hours and Out of Hours services, this project was based upon a sample survey of Cheshire East and Cheshire West and Chester residents. This included question relating to whether people had used each service, whether they had heard of it and how, and what they thought of the service they received. As well as allowing us to gain an insight into Extended Hours and Out of Hours, they were also able to signpost people to these services where they were not aware of them.
The sample survey was completed over the winter period from November 2017 to February 2018, which anecdotally has been one of the toughest periods in recent years for the NHS. The sample totalled 98 people who responded to the survey.
The sample findings present a mixed picture, with Out of Hours appearing to be more widely used than Extended Hours services in Cheshire according to our sample of respondents.