Practice Based Telephony

You may have heard about NHSE England’s plan to update the GP practice phone system in the news today.

We wanted to let you know that in April we chose a phone provider who would allow us to do everything NHS England have announced including allowing people to receive a call back from the practice to save them waiting in the queue and allowing for more resilience and flexibility in the service we provide our patients.

In May NHS England announced changes that all practices should allow a call back, however the system that we, and may others in the area chose was not on the newly created preferred suppliers list. This has resulted in us having to investigate alternative providers.

As a practice we now have our preferred supplier and are looking at moving forward with this. We are investigating a collaborative approach as a PCN network and are wating for information from the ICB (due in the next two or three weeks) before we are able to make the final decision. It is our aim to have this in place before the end of the year.

We have received an anonymous review about not using technology and wanted to let people know we are working towards it and have been for a while. We will also be making more use of the NHS App and in September will be rolling out the use of PATCHS to allow people to book certain appointments and to improve patient and practice communication as well as take advantage of AI integration.

As NHS England has moved towards triage, signposting and care navigation, something we have done for a number of years, we will continue to make appointments with the most appropriate clinician and organisation.

If anyone has any suggestions or comments, then please contact The Friends of The Village Practice PPG Group or use the contact us section of the website.