Planned changes to Health and Social Care Bill fail to win GPs’ confidence

Aug. 12, 2011 - PRLog -- medeConnect survey finds many GPs are confused by reforms

A survey, conducted by online research expert medeConnect Healthcare Insight, shows the Government’s planned changes to the Health and Social Care Bill have failed to reassure many GPs.  

The tracking research*, which was conducted recently among GPs practising in England and followed an earlier study in April this year, found that overall 57 per cent of GPs said discussions on GP commissioning during the ‘listening exercise’ had a negative impact’ on their confidence in the Bill. Indeed, GP principals were significantly more negative than GP non-principals overall (62 per cent compared with 49 per cent respectively).

However, when compared with the results of our April survey, the number of non-principal GPs who believed the Reforms would have ‘a very negative impact’ on their confidence in the White Paper had declined from 25 per cent to 17 per cent overall.

On the subject of the impact of the proposed Reforms on the quality of care patients receive as a result of opening up commissioning to other groups, 49 per cent of GP principals thought that this would have a negative impact on patient care; while 43 per cent of GP non-principals believed that would be the case.

There is also a belief among GPs that their ability to influence the quality of patient care will be impacted by extending commissioning. Fifty seven per cent of GPs overall thought that extending commissioning would have either a ‘very’ or ‘slightly negative impact’ on their ability to influence the quality of healthcare patients receive. GP principals in particular were more negative on this point overall with 27 per cent stating that opening up the service would have a ‘very negative impact’ on their ability to influence the quality of healthcare patients will receive.

The research, which was carried out following the Government’s listening exercise, also asked GPs to choose the four words or phrases that most described their view of the future of GP practice. The findings show that GP principals were significantly more likely to chose the word ‘confusing’ in our latest survey compared with our April survey (55 per cent compared to 48 per cent respectively) and less likely to select challenging (49 per cent compared with 57 per cent), ‘empowering’ (6 per cent compared with 10 per cent) and ‘revolutionary’ (5 per cent versus 10 per cent).

Anna Garofalo, Managing Director of medeConnect, the independent market research division of Doctors.net.uk – the UK’s largest and most active network of medical professionals, said: “Our research shows that many GPs (and in particular GP principals) still view the Health and Social Care Bill in a negative light following the Government’s listening exercise.

“The bid to extend the commissioning process to other groups is a source of concern for many GP principals, many of whom believe that it will be detrimental to patient care.”

For more information:
Andrew Baud, Tala
andrew.baud@talapr.co.uk
+44 (0) 20 3397 3383

Notes to editors:
* 820 GPs practising in England were interviewed in April and 843 in June.
About medeConnect
medeConnect is an expert in online, community-based research, with unrivalled understanding of Europe’s medical professionals.  It is the independent market research division of Doctors.net.uk and has access to and understanding of medical professionals via a range of state-of-the-art research tools and techniques.