World's biggest health database goes live, UK

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Article Date: 03 Sep 2005 - 21:00 PST

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New system makes it easier to monitor patients with long-term conditions -

The world's most comprehensive database on the prevalence and management of common chronic diseases went live today. This database, made up of results from a new GP payment system, makes NHS GPs world leaders in the management of common chronic diseases. Over time this will help the NHS to tackle health inequalities by targeting those at risk and focusing resources appropriately.

Health Minister Lord Warner congratulated GPs for delivering high quality services to NHS patients. Other results from the new payment system for GPs show that patients are receiving a high standard of care and treatment from their local GP practices.

Under the system, known as the Quality and Outcomes Framework, GP practices score points for achievement against a range of indicators - such as the number of patients with heart disease who also receive a flu jab. The more points the practice achieves, and the more services they provide, the more money they earn, although the final sum paid to practices is also adjusted to take account of their workload and the relative health of patients in their area.

GP practices also systematically record patient information. This means that patients with chronic conditions like diabetes and coronary heart disease benefit from good quality, consistent care, because the system makes it easy for GPs to recall patients for follow-up appointments and to know when checks are due.

NHS GP practices scored highly against a range of checks covering all aspects of care from diagnosis and ongoing management of conditions to record keeping, communication and the overall experience of patients. On average, each practice achieved 91 per cent of the points available - or 959 out of a possible 1050 points.

These excellent results show that the new system is giving GPs a real incentive to improve the quality of care they offer to patients and to manage chronic conditions effectively. For the first time ever, GP practices are rewarded for the outcomes they achieve with patients, not just the volume of work that they do.

Health Minister Lord Warner said:

"This new system gives the NHS, for the first time ever, world-leading intelligence on chronic diseases like diabetes and heart disease. This means that in future the NHS will be able to map populations with these debilitating conditions with pinpoint accuracy. As the database builds up it will allow us to focus resources and plan services appropriately to help us tackle health inequalities. That means good news for NHS patients and good value for money for taxpayers.

"I congratulate GPs on their achievement and for their high participation in this scheme. The high scores show that the new GP contract we put in place last year is proving successful in giving practices a real incentive to improve the quality of care for NHS patients and to provide a wide range of services locally.

"Increased investment in local health and care services is good news for patients, who benefit from better care and provides a basis for even greater improvement in services outside hospitals - a key aim."

An average sized GP practice which gets an average QOF score will receive £74,299 extra, with the total package of resources and rewards for all NHS GP practices totalling around £630 million. QOF is part of the new General Medical Services contract, which delivers £1.8bn extra investment in primary care over three years.

Many GPs are reinvesting this extra money into better services to benefit their patients. For example, extra money from QOF has allowed Rosehill Practice in Burnley to give their practice nurses and health care assistant more training, and to employ them for more hours. As a result, the practice has been able to increase the frequency of their diabetic, heart disease and asthma clinic appointments, and patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease are now being seen every 9 months as opposed to 18. …. CONTINUES …….. UK Dept of Health

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