High Performance Scores For GP Practices Against Revised Quality Framework, UK

Main Category: Primary Care / General Practice
Article Date: 29 Sep 2007 - 1:00 PDT

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New figures from The Information Centre for health and social care show that GP practices in England continue to deliver high quality care against a more challenging set of indicators.

In 2006/07 practices were awarded an average score of 95.5 per cent achievement against a set of indicators of the quality of care provided to patients.

These indicators are within the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF), introduced as part of the General Medical Services (GMS) contract in April 2004. The QOF was revised in 2006, with higher thresholds required for the achievement of QOF points for individual indicators, the addition of indicators for more clinical areas, and a new maximum total of 1,000 points. QOF points achieved by practices are used as the basis for QOF payments to practices as part of practice contracts.

- A full online database of the 2006/07 QOF results for every GP practice in England is available at http://www.qof.ic.nhs.uk

In 2006/07 practices in England achieved an average of 954.5 QOF points, 95.5 per cent of the 1,000 available. This compares with an average achievement of 96.2 per cent in 2005/06 and 91.3 per cent in 2004/05, before the revision of the QOF in 2006.

The average number of points achieved by practices in each of the 152 primary care trusts (PCTs) ranged from 858.6 points (85.9 per cent of points available) to 986.4 points (98.6 per cent) of points available. This compares with a range of 86.6 per cent to 99.7 per cent the previous year, prior to the revision to the QOF, and when there were 303 PCTs.

The number of GP practices achieving the maximum score of 1,000 points was 427 (5.1per cent). This compares with the 813 practices (9.7 per cent) that achieved the maximum 1,050 points in 2005/06, and the 222 practices (2.6 per cent) of practices that achieved the maximum 1,050 points in 2004/05, the first year of the QOF. The reduction in the number of practices achieving maximum points this year is related to the introduction of new clinical areas and higher thresholds to the QOF in 2006/07. Practices had to achieve quality indicators in new clinical areas and higher levels of achievement in existing areas to maintain the same number of points as last year.

The QOF was introduced as part of the new primary care contracting arrangements to reward practices for the quality of their services. Practices take part voluntarily and the scheme awards points for: specific aspects of clinical care, how well the practice is organised, the patient experience and the extra services offered by the practice such as child health and maternity services. As a practice achieves more QOF points and provides more services, the QOF payments will increase.

The latest figures follow the introduction from April 2006 of a revised QOF which was designed to ensure that general practice continues to deliver better services for patients. The IC's acting chief executive Tim Straughan said: "QOF is a mechanism for paying practices for the quality of care they provide to patients. By putting the results of every practice online, the IC is working to make as much information about primary care services as possible easily available to patients and the public."

A summary bulletin reporting the statistics for England, and spreadsheets of data at national, regional and local level are available at http://www.ic.nhs.uk/pubs/qof0607

o The IC has also issued today updated estimates of NHS earnings, statistics on smoking and immunisation and a times series analysis for selected clinical indicators from the QOF. Full details can be found at http://www.ic.nhs.uk

1. The Information Centre (The IC) is England's authoritative, independent source of health and social care information. It works with more than 300 health and social care providers nationwide to provide the facts and figures that help the NHS and social services run effectively. Its role is to collect data, analyse it and convert it into useful information which helps providers improve their services and supports academics, researcher, regulators and policymakers in their work. The IC also produces more than 120 statistical publications each year across a number of areas including: primary care, health and lifestyles, screening, hospital care, population and geography, social care and workforce and pay statistics.

2. QOF was introduced as part of the new primary care contracting arrangements in April 2004. Participation by practices is voluntary though participation rates are high.

3. QOF information is derived from the Quality Management Analysis System (QMAS), a national IT system developed by NHS Connecting for Health. QMAS uses data from general practices to calculate individual practices' QOF achievement and payments.

4. The IC's online GP practice database http://www.qof.ic.nhs.uk shows patients how well their GPs surgery is doing by detailing the scores of individual surgeries and comparing achievement against national and regional figures. For a full overview of QOF, including this year's results and related spreadsheets, see here.

http://www.ic.nhs.uk/