Primary Care Bulletin - today's round-up

1 June 2021

Dear colleagues,

It has been a challenging few weeks and we hope you got some downtime over the bank holiday. Don’t forget our #LookingAfterYouToo and #LookingAfterYourTeam accessible one-to-one coaching offers, which provide direct access to free and confidential support to all staff working across primary care. In this blog Jill, a practice manager, and her coach discuss their positive coaching experience. Also below are details of our mentoring scheme for GPs. Other career support packages can be found on the GP Career Support Hub - FutureNHS Collaboration Platform.

Help us arrange a tea break on the NHS birthday

As part of plans to celebrate the NHS’s 73rd birthday, the #NHSBigTea is a chance to come together to thank NHS staff and our communities for their hard work over the last year. The NHS Big Tea in 2019 saw hundreds of events in hospitals, ambulance services, community and mental health trusts across the UK. This year, help break the record and organise a tea in every NHS setting, raising a mug in collective thanks at 3pm on 5 July. Register online and get access to resources to help you plan your tea party, virtually or in person.

Best wishes

Nikki and Ed

COVID-19 updates

UPDATED: UK Infection Prevention and Control Guidance

Public Health England has published an update to the UK Infection Prevention and Control guidance, agreed by the UK’s four chief medical and nursing officers.

Amendments have been made to strengthen existing messaging and provide further advice where needed, including updates on the hierarchy of controls, clarity over the use of valved respirators, and highlighting the need to protect those previously shielding and who are considered clinically extremely vulnerable from COVID-19. Definitions and supporting resources have been added to support risk assessment based on the hierarchy of controls.

A full list of changes to the previous version are listed on page 8 of the guidance. Following continued extensive clinical and scientific review, no changes to the recommendations, including PPE, have been made in response to the new variant strains at this stage, however this position remains under constant review.

All NHS organisations should ensure reliable application of all IPC recommendations and assurance on adherence, that PPE is available and in supply, and that all staff training is up to date.

General practice

Expansion of the Supporting Mentors Scheme for GPs

The Supporting Mentors Scheme provides experienced GPs with a mentoring qualification, as well as one funded mentoring session a week. There are now almost 300 trained GP mentors providing support to our newly qualified GPs on the GP Fellowship scheme, and the pool of mentors continues to grow.

We have listened to scheme feedback and have expanded the criteria of GPs who can be mentored if all Fellowship mentoring needs have been met. This could include, for instance, GPs who are new to partnership or on the National GP Retention Scheme. This year we are also able to reimburse up to four sessions for mentorship training.

If you are interested in the scheme, further guidance is available online. Don’t forget to look at the GP career support hub to find out about other schemes that may be available.

PCSE Online GP Payments and Pensions now live

The new online GP Payments and Pensions (GPPP) service from PCSE is now live. This system allows practices and GP colleagues to manage payment and pensions administration online, including review monthly statements, submit and track payment claims, as well as making it easier to submit pension information, such as estimates of pay and profits, and view previous submissions.

To ensure that GP Performers can access all aspects of the new service, and access historic pensions data, they have been assigned all available GP roles on PCSE Online. This means GPs will have received multiple automated emails allocating these roles to them, but please note there is no change or impact to their status for the Performers List.

Further information on what you can do with the new GPPP system, together with information how to gain access, useful guides for each of the services and helpful videos to take you through the new processes is available via the PCSE website.

England Medical Performers List (EMPL) Regulations

We and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) are undertaking a joint review of bureaucracy in general practice. This review is in line with the government commitment to reduce excess bureaucracy in the health and care system. The aim of the review is to identify and remove unnecessary burdens, duplication and overlap for those working in primary care.

DHSC has commissioned NHSEI to review the England Medical Performers List (EMPL) Regulations in the context of the wider regulatory landscape  in operation across England. This review will identify where regulatory requirements can be streamlined and simplified, while maintaining the high professional standards that ensures patient safety.

The review commenced on the 17 May 2021 and will be completed by 17 September 2021. We will consider the recommendations from the review in the Autumn of 2021 and any proposed changes will be subject to a public consultation.

NHSBSA plans to digitise Personally Administered Medicines claim and payment processes for general practice

In response to feedback about the administrative burden associated with the claim and payment processes for agreed items that GPs can administer (this includes high volume items such as the seasonal flu vaccine), the NHS Business Service Authority (NHSBSA) are exploring solutions to digitalise the forms and automate payments. Modernising this process is expected to bring benefits to GP practices and remove the time consuming nature of manually submitting paper forms for reimbursement, as well as minimise the errors and problems that current working practices can generate in reconciling claims and payments.

NHSBSA would welcome the help of practice managers and other interested persons to help inform the solution design and its implementation. If you would like to be part of the working group please contact: nicholas.walton@nhs.net.

General practice - latest updates

Community pharmacy

Community Pharmacy Workforce Survey 2021 launched

The Community Pharmacy Workforce Survey (CPWS) 2021 was launched by Health Education England on 7 May and will close by mid-June. The CPWS 2021 aims to provide an up-to-date picture of the size and shape of the community pharmacy workforce (including locums) in order to:

• inform workforce planning and future investment in education and training for the entire community pharmacy workforce;
• guide the overall workforce development strategy for the NHS; and
• inform on community pharmacy’s current contribution to local health systems across England – e.g. Primary Care Networks (PCNs) and Integrated Care Systems (ICSs).

Primary care

National Stroke Service Model sets out best practice for stroke care in England

NHS England and NHS Improvement has published the National Stroke Service Model outlining best practice for stroke care in England. The model sets out how integrated stroke delivery networks (ISDNs) in all areas of the country will bring services together to design optimal stroke care for patients.

Using a full-pathway approach, ISDNs will prevent thousands of patients suffering a stroke and ensure improved patient outcomes through faster diagnosis and access to treatment in 24/7 specialist stroke units. It will also increase the availability of high-quality rehabilitation and ongoing community care to rebuild patients’ lives after a stroke.

For more information, please contact: england.clinicalpolicy@nhs.net.

Guidance to support people who feel anxious about attending for cervical screening

Public Health England (PHE) has published a national information resource to support people who feel anxious about attending NHS cervical screening appointments. In developing the resource PHE has worked with service users and health professionals from The Havens network of specialist sexual assault referral centres, to ensure the content and language used is inclusive and acceptable to those who will benefit from it. 

Although the content is based on the information used in the standard national leaflet for the programme, it also includes additional guidance on:

• Booking the screening test, including pre-visits, early morning appointments and longer appointments
• Planning your journey to the appointment
• Questions to ask the health professional taking the sample
• Other support services

To accompany the guidance, PHE has also published a checklist which service users can complete and take to their screening appointment to help inform the sample taker of any extra support they may require.

The expansion of the home testing Faecal Immunochemical Test kit (FIT kit) programme

From April 2021, the population eligible to receive a Faecal Immunochemical Test (FIT) kit has been expanded to include 56 year olds, as part of the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme. This is the first phase of the roll out of age extension in the NHS bowel cancer screening programme to incorporate 50-59 year olds over the next four years, as set out in the NHS Long Term Plan 2019. This gradual expansion also allows for a continued focus on fully restoring the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme for 60-74 year olds following the impact of COVID-19.

People invited for bowel scope screening prior to the service being decommissioned, but who were not screened due to the pandemic, were prioritised and all sent an invitation to receive a FIT kit in April 2021.

Dates for your diary

Wednesday 2 June, 11am – 12.30pm. Anticipatory Care - Data Sharing and Digital Tools for MDTs

Thursday 3 June, 1.30pm – 2.30pm. Boosting vaccine confidence within African and Caribbean communities

Thursday 3 June, 5pm – 6pm. General Practice webinar. Please note: new registrations opened for this webinar series on 11 May. In order to ensure our list is up to date we asked everyone to register for the series again from 11 May. You WILL need to register again if you have registered for our webinars prior to this date.

Monday 7 June, 5pm – 6.30pm. Best MSKHealth Collaborative Update and FutureNHS Launch

Tuesday 8 June, 7pm – 8.30pm. Post COVID-19 syndrome (“Long covid”) Where are we now? RCGP webinar.

 Wednesday 9th June 11am – 12.30pm. Anticipatory Care - Personalised Care within Anticipatory Care  

GP Appointment Data: GP practice briefing. These sessions hosted by NHS Digital will introduce recently issued national categorisation guidance and show practices how to carry out mapping to the new national standard categories. There are several dates available:

• Wednesday 9 June, 11.30am – 12.30pm
• Tuesday 15 June, 5pm – 6pm

 Wednesday 23 June, 5.30pm – 7.00pm. PCN webinar: Building and housing your primary care network team

Link of the day

Which patients miss appointments in General Practice?