Agenda item

Dr Andrew Steeden – GP Borough Lead, NWL CCG (West)
Dr Mona Vaidya – GP Borough Lead, NWL CCG (Central)

6.1 Dr. Andrew Steeden (Borough Director, Central London CCG) and Dr. Mona Vaidya (Central London CCG)presented an update on Primary Care.  

6.2 Primary Care was working under stress over the last 18 months, particularly over the winter period. The booster campaign was accelerated over the latter period of the last year in addition to the arrival of the Omicron variant.  

6.3By the beginning of December, North West London had delivered over 4 million vaccines, which was the highest of any sector in the UK.  

6.4 There was a target of delivering 230,000 a week in December, it was not achieved, but there was an increase from 65,000 vaccines a week up to 180,000 vaccines across North West London.  

6.5 In the five-week period in December, West and Central London delivered over 83,000 vaccines, and were two of best performing boroughs with regards to the booster campaign over the winter period.  

6.6 North West London was still delivering 5,000 first vaccines a week, there were plans around delivering vaccines to groups with less uptake. Primary Care Networks (PCNs) were preparing to deliver vaccines to 5- to 11-year-olds who were clinically extremely vulnerable.  

6.7 On the Winter Access Fund, £1 million was allocated to Westminster and around £900,000 was allocated to West London CCG. The objective of the Fund was to increase capacity and improve access from November to March.  

6.8There was a clear instruction to focus on vulnerable groups. Monitoring and access did not stop for patients that were in need.  

6.9 Hubs were providing more access by creating ‘mini-hubs’ in deprived PCNs, which provided overflow services for practices in the area. The hubs increased the capacity for 111 referrals and support the process of remote monitoring. People were employed locally, which helped to ensure work would continue into the future.  

6.10       There had been work around care homes, as well as community champions who focused on high intensity users.  

6.11       Telephony had been identified as an issue and as a result cloud-based telephony would soon be introduced.  

6.12       Work was still ongoing with the Local Authority to deliver on the Afghan evacuees programme which supported over 700 people.  

6.13       In response to questions, the following points were raised: 

       i.          Practices were delivering face-to-face appointments and offering routine appointments where they were required.   

     ii.          Residents continued to report to Healthwatch querying when they would have routine access to patients.  

    iii.          Primary Care was looking towards a structured return over the next few months.  

    iv.          Many BAME patients had language barriers and could not adequately express their problems in order to access face-to-face appointments.  

     v.          Central and West London were closer to 70% mark in terms of delivering face-to-face appointments. 

    vi.          Primary Care was working with Healthwatch to create a structure that would implement patient feedback into all levels. 

   vii.          There was also a structured NWL CCG engagement programme which was attempting to incorporate ongoing patient and resident engagement into CCG policy, strategy and codesign of services.