27 November 2025

The latest news and updates from NHS England for those working in Primary Care.

This week’s issue covers:

• Cloud-based telephony data published

• Urgent dental care incentive scheme – deadline extended

Primary care

Opportunities for primary care colleagues to join fully and partially funded leadership programmes

All primary care staff, including general practice, community pharmacy, dentistry and optometry can now register interest for the fully funded Mary Seacole and Rosalind Franklin (CMI) leadership programmes, and the partially funded Elizabeth Garrett Anderson programme.

Places are limited, so early registration is encouraged. The deadline is Sunday, 11 January. Details on cohort dates and application process will follow. Start conversations with your line manager and register your interest.

Flu vaccination drive – countdown to Christmas 

The NHS is making it easier than ever for people to get the flu vaccine in the run up to the festive period. The NHS has already issued a flu SOS with cases rising and the flu season starting earlier than usual. To further support this, with Christmas approaching, a communications toolkit, including ‘protect your festive season with a flu vaccine’ assets, is available

Pharmacies should update their walk-in service details on NHS Profile Manager to help patients find them. Plenty of flu vaccine remains available. Order now to protect all eligible patients. Ordering information:

Sanofi TIV-HD

• Online: VaxiShop
• Phone: 0800 854430
• Email:  GB-vaccinecustomerservices@sanofi.com
• No minimum order; 48-hour delivery

Seqirus – aTIV and TIVc

• Online: flu360.co.uk
• Phone: 0845 745 1500
• Email:  service.uk@seqirus.com
• Minimum 20 doses; 48-hour delivery.

Vaccine supply is also available from wholesalers. Thank you to colleagues for your continued work to protect patients. 

Early influenza virus characterisation and vaccine effectiveness in England in autumn 2025

Early analysis on flu vaccine effectiveness shows it is providing strong protection for all, typically as seen in other years, despite the emergence of a new “drifted” flu sub-strain, (also known as subclade k), driving an unusually early flu season.

The data suggests the nasal spray vaccine is particularly effective in protecting children from more severe disease and vaccination in younger people is effective in helping stop the spread of flu to others. UKHSA have published a series of useful blogs on how vaccines protect against different flu types blog post, ‘a guide to who’s eligible for the autumn 2025 flu vaccine’ and ‘Do I have flu, COVID-19 or a cold? Know the signs and symptoms’.

General practice

Cloud-based telephony data published

Cloud-based telephony (CBT) data has been published today at GP practice level for the first time via the NHS England website.

Publication of CBT data will enable analysis to measure patient-initiated demand and the ease of patients being able to contact their GP practice.

Key metrics include call volumes, call outcome (answered, missed, resulting in a call back request, or ending in response to an automated message or diversion) and call wait times and duration. Data is available by day of the week and time of day and will be updated monthly.

This new dataset is published alongside the GP appointment and online consultation data.

New GP contract consultation process

Government is widening the consultation on the GP contract to include additional stakeholders. As well as BMA GPCE, government will also consult with the RCGP, the National Association of Primary Care (NAPC), Healthwatch England, National Voices and the NHS Confederation. The purpose of the consultation will be to seek feedback and consult on policy proposals.

The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has also today (27 November) written to all practices.

General Practice staff survey 2025

The General Practice Staff Survey provides an opportunity for general practice staff to share their experiences, highlight what’s working, and help improve the experience of staff.

Results will be shared directly with participating organisations with more than 10 responses. The survey closes tomorrow, 28 November 2025. 

Updated IV Therapy Passport e-learning now live

Following a recent update, the IV Therapy Passport e-learning programme is now live and freely available to all registered health and social care undergraduates and professionals, who administer intravenous medication for patients.

The Passport is a comprehensive training and assessment tool that combines both theory and practical components. The new Passport also enables the workforce to transfer their digital IV competencies between organisations without the need to retrain.

GIRFT seeks input on the delivery of MSK First Contact Physiotherapy services

GP practice managers and primary care network (PCN) leads with a responsibility for MSK First Contact Physiotherapy (FCP) services are invited to complete a short five-to-ten minute questionnaire. The aim is to build an understanding of how FCP services are currently working across England and to identify opportunities for improvement.

The evaluation is being led by GIRFT, an NHS England improvement programme, in collaboration with the government’s joint work and health directorate and the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy. The survey runs until 1 December 2025.

NHS Retrospective Genetic Testing Programme

The NHS Retrospective Genetic Testing Programme has begun to be rolled out nationally, inviting people for genetic testing via R208/7 panels who have historically received a diagnosis of high grade non-mucinous epithelial ovarian cancer or an eligible breast cancer (triple negative, bilateral, young onset, or male breast cancer). These patients are eligible for genetic testing as outlined in the National Genomic Test Directory, but records indicate they have not yet received testing.

The programme is systematically sending invites to people’s home addresses. If anyone presents to their GP with questions, they should be advised that if they are eligible for the programme, they will receive an invite in due course. Patients can be directed to the programme hotline for support: 020 3437 6001.

If primary care colleagues would like any further information about the programme, please contact england.edcancer@nhs.net 

NHS App notification and messaging basics webinar for GP teams

Join NHS England’s NHS App teams for an overview on Notifications and Messaging in the NHS App – Thursday 4 December at 11.30am to 12.30pm. 

This session will cover the basics of notifications and messaging in the NHS App, helping you to see how practice managers can send messages to patients in the App, benefiting from savings on SMS fragments. Hear from the App team and practice managers on the benefits of sending messages in the App and how to successfully promote messages in the App to patients. Register for the webinar.

GPs – become a practice educator supporting the adult social care nurse prescribing pilot

The Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC)’s Adult Social Care (ASC) Nurse Prescribing Pilot supports nurses to qualify to prescribe medicines within their ASC setting. Six Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) are taking part in the pilot:

• Bedfordshire, Luton, Milton Keynes

• Cheshire and Merseyside in collaboration with Greater Manchester, Lancashire and South Cumbria
• Coventry and Warwickshire
• Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland
• Nottingham and Nottinghamshire in collaboration with Derby and Derbyshire
• South Yorkshire

Participating nurses will need a practice educator to provide supervision and assessment. GPs interested in becoming a practice educator should contact their ICB.

Adult social care nurses within participating regions can get involved contacting their ICB. If they do not have ICB contact details, they can email england.nursingleadership-development@nhs.net.

Learning sessions: delivering the People Promise in general practice

These learning sessions are focused on embedding the NHS People Promise within general practice.

Each session will explore a different theme, offering practical advice, tools, and examples to support teams in creating positive, inclusive workplace cultures. All dates and links to sign up are available below:

• 2 December 2025 – Health and Wellbeing in General Practice
• 10 December 2025 – Management and Leadership Development in General Practice
• 14 January 2026 – General Practice Staff Survey Learning Session 
• 22 January 2026 - GP Developing Case Studies Session

Dentistry

Urgent dental care incentive scheme – deadline extended

NHS England has published updates to the urgent dental care incentive scheme. This includes extending the sign-up deadline for participants until 19 December and lifting the cap on the incentive payment.

The urgent dental care incentive (UDCI) scheme will run until 31 March 2026 and aims to incentivise eligible dental providers and their oral healthcare teams to provide more unscheduled care to patients in 2025/26.

The in-year financial incentive scheme for mandatory services contract-holders aims to bolster the additional capacity that ICBs have already established, helping to secure the 700,000 more urgent dental care appointments this financial year. Further information about the scheme is outlined in the letter.

A webinar on the scheme was held for dental providers in September: https://future.nhs.uk/DENTISTRY/view?objectId=262731845

Community pharmacy

NHS Confed sets up Community Pharmacy Leaders Forum

The NHS Confederation’s primary care network has established a Community Pharmacy Leaders Forum to equip and enable leaders to influence system-level decisions and neighbourhood health models, and to foster a culture of collaboration. It is seeking expressions of interest from both NHS Confederation members and non-members to join the forum, which aims to shape national policy and advocacy, support leadership development and align community pharmacy with system transformation efforts.

Get involved

NHS ConfedExpo returns on 10-11 June 2026

NHS ConfedExpo is back for 2026 and registration is now open. 

Connect with key decision makers and explore innovative ideas that are helping to drive positive change for patients and the public. NHS ConfedExpo is inviting proposals from organisations and partners working in primary care to share their bold ideas or practical insights that could inspire others and show how teams are turning the 10 Year Health Plan into a reality.

The submission portal is now open. Find out more about the submission process. Book your place today: NHS, local authority and wider public sector staff are eligible for a free ticket.  

New 30-minute staff training helps support Armed Forces patients 

A new training and education programme has been introduced to help all NHS staff to meet the evolving needs of the Armed Forces community. Sessions are available to book online.

The programme equips busy teams with specialist insight, knowledge and resources to provide the best care possible to this patient group. The programme is being delivered by dedicated regional trainers and comprises a range of modules. Please see this short video on the programme by veteran, gold-medal winning Paralympian and regional trainer Gregg Stevenson MBE. 

Visit www.armedforceshealthtraining.nhs.uk or contact the regional trainer at rnoh.vcha.ntep@nhs.net.  

Reminder: Registration open for the 2025 NHS Genomics Healthcare Summit 

The NHS Genomics Healthcare Summit is a key event in the field of genomics, welcoming primary care practitioners who want to get more involved in this field. Register online for the event which will take place on 15 and 16 December in London.

Upcoming webinars and events

• 2 Dec 12-1pm. Delivering the People Promise in general practice webinar: Health and Wellbeing in General Practice 
• 2 Dec 1-2pm. Primary care discussion: hypertension care in community pharmacy 
• 4 Dec, 12pm – 1pm. NHS Confederation webinar. Realising the Potential of Primary Care Provider Collaboratives: Financing Opportunities for Working at Scale 
• 4 Dec 1-3.30pm. Latest developments in Health and Justice Medicines Optimisation 

• 4 December 2025, 11.30am-12.30pm NHS App Notification and Messaging basics webinar

• 10 Dec 12-1pm. Delivering the People Promise in general practice webinar: Management and Leadership Development in General Practice 
• 10 December 2025 1pm-3pm Make Every Contact Count (MECC): Supporting Access to Vaccination and Screening Webinar
• 14 Jan 12-1pm. Delivering the People Promise in general practice webinar:  General Practice Staff Survey Learning Session  

Catch up

Missed a recent national webinar? View slides and recordings below:

• General Practice webinars