All GP practices in north west London sign up to provide online services
All GP practices in north west London have signed up to provide a suite of online services to their patients.
The GP online service allow registered patients to book and cancel appointments, order repeat prescriptions and view their GP records.
Kwesi Afful, digital innovation lead for North West London Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) said: “GP online is the first step in supporting our patients to embrace the use of digital apps to help manage their health and transform the way they access health services.
“The next step is to encourage patients to use their accounts more frequently and then to start introducing other ways to engage with and access GP services.”
Since the online system was introduced, more then 25% of registered GP users have made use of the service with over 83,000 appointments being booked online.
The CCG has also claimed that because patients are using their GP Online accounts to book appointments rather than doing so in person or over the phone, practices have saved 1,460 days.
It is hoped that over the next year patients will be able to do even more, with developments already being made to allow patients to see information such as their immunisation records and test results.
It is not just GP practices in north west London that are embracing digital as a way of engaging patients.
Last week, Digital Health News reported on how the Eastern Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) has launched a series of podcasts which explore innovations that can help ease pressures in primary care.
9 Comments
Allowing patients to book appointments online is simply wasteful. They need help, yes, but only about one third need a face to face with the GP. Introducing digital triage is what really saves GP time as well as giving patients a fabulous service. DOI, that’s what we do with askmyGP, and productivity shoots up.
Excuse me, but how is this NEWS. As a patient I’ve been able to book/cancel appts, order scripts, change address details and view my Medical Record for at least 4 years using Patient Access.
So as well as the 3 big clinical system providers own patient facing apps, there are other numerous providers of GP online services. Some but not all are shown via that link so which one are the CCG implementing / promoting to patients?
Why…. is this “news”? GP surgeries across England have been doing this for years – we’re contractually obliged to.
Completely agree with Dr Bhatia – as someone living in North West London, I got really excited at the headline until I read it was just the basics that we’ve been using, as patients, for many years. There’s so much more that we could have now, too, in the way of online services that would benefit both doctors and patients!
Embracing digital? You are having laugh! Those who were embracing this sort of thing have been doing it for 3 or 4 years as per GP contracts . Too many GPs are still cowering behind the fax machines refusing to change and in breach of contract and blocking patients That should be the real story.
“From April 2014, GP practices were required to promote and offer the facility for patients to order, view and print repeat prescriptions for drugs, medicines and appliances online. ”
“From April 2014, GP practices were required to promote and offer the facility for patients to book, view, amend, cancel and print appointments online. ”
“Following the 2015-2016 GP contract negotiations, GP practices will also be required to offer online access to the detailed information from the medical record i.e. information held in coded form.”
I may be missing something here… but wan’t that part of the contractual requirements for every GP practice anyway via their clinical system provider?
You aren’t missing anything. The real story is how many GPs are in breach of contact and have been allowed to be for many years, meanwhile getting hysterical when more modern and effective services start to erode their monopoly.
I would love to bin my fax machine. We no longer send any faxes. unfortunately half the hospitals seem incapable of using email or electronic discharge formats to any practices except their local ones. I also know of several services that say they are unable to receive email…I assume it is because it is not compatible with oil lamps and morse code.
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