SHA report finds concerns in out of hours services in Peterborough

Out of hours GP services in Peterborough were subject to a peer review by East of England strategic health authority.

A report on the review found an arrangement for OOH GPs to work between 12am and 6am “on-call”, rather than “at-base”, was “an exception nationally and poor
practice”.

It also said the PCT must “urgently rationalise” some of its medicines mangament in relation to opiates.

The review did find areas of good practice for NHS Peterborough, including alerts for palliative care patients; monthly meetings within the service to discuss cases and learn from events; and unannounced visits by the commissioner.

But it also found areas to be developed. These included a need to understand the patient pathway in more detail; the commissioner and provider need to separate out accountability and responsibility; and the provider needs to be more pro-active about sharing useful information they collect with the commissioner and not just responding to requests for routine and ad-hoc reporting.