Supporting primary care improvements for patients with long term conditions • City, University of London

Report from the Centre for Healthcare Innovation Research suggests that a primary care framework for six long term conditions may improve workforce capacity and patient care.

By Mr Shamim Quadir (Senior Communications Officer), Published Friday, 6^th May 2022 (Updated Thursday, 12^th May 2022)

A new report, authored by the Centre for Healthcare Innovation Research (CHIR) at City, University of London has evaluated the implementation of UCLPartner’s Proactive Care Frameworks across six pilot sites across England. The report suggests that the frameworks may improve workforce capacity and patient care of those with long-term conditions.

In 2020, UCLPartners developed the series of Proactive Care Frameworks with the aim of helping people who are living with long term conditions stay well during COVID-19 and beyond, and to support the primary care system to recover post pandemic.

The frameworks, which focus on Hypertension, Type 2 Diabetes, Cholesterol, Atrial Fibrillation, Asthma, and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) are underpinned by risk stratification and prioritisation tools. They seek to optimise workforce capacity and utilise available digital resources, to aid in a step change in the self-management, remote support, and personalisation of care of patients with these conditions.

On Tuesday 10^th May 2022, the CHIR team will help deliver a webinar about the Proactive Care Framework and which will include an explanation of their work and what their findings could mean for primary care provision moving forward.

Dr Alexandra Ziemann, Senior Research Fellow at CHIR and first author of the report, reflected:

“This review summarises qualitative feedback we collected through interviewing 41 staff members involved in the implementation of proactive care frameworks. The interviewees demonstrated a shared belief that these frameworks could be truly transformative for how primary care operates across England. We’re very much looking forward to the next round of evaluation which will look to assess the impact on patient experience and outcomes.”

Speaking to UCLPartners, Kerry Gardner, Group Lead Nurse at Lakeside Healthcare Group, which was one of the pilot sites said:

We found applying the framework risk stratification tools helped us to assign the appropriate level of care to each of our patients. This expanded our workforce capacity because each member of the team was working to the top of their licence, thus dealing with a workload best suited to their skillset. We managed to get 650 more cervical smears done in one of our sites and our more highly skilled staff were available for more complex or high-risk cases.

Dr Matt Kearney, General Practitioner and Programme Director at UCLPartners said: “This report offers early evidence that the UCLPartners Proactive Care Frameworks can be successfully adopted by primary care. They demonstrate the potential positive impact on patient outcomes and on the capability and capacity of the wider primary care workforce. As Proactive Care frameworks embed, we must continue to monitor and gather insights from local experience of implementation. It is this knowledge that will ensure the frameworks and resources can be adapted where needed and that their potential to transform care is optimised.”