16.07.14
Calls for out-of-hours GPs in A&E departments
Every NHS emergency department should have a co-located, out-of-hours primary care facility, a group of leading doctors have stated.
Senior officials at the College of Emergency Medicine, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Surgeons, have argued that urgent care needs cannot be delivered in the same framework as emergency care.
In a joint report – Acute and emergency care: prescribing the remedy – the colleges made 13 recommendations to address the challenges facing urgent and emergency care services across the UK and Ireland.
These range from having trainee doctors on acute specialty programmes rotating through the
emergency department; community and social care being coordinated effectively to deliver seven days a week support to urgent and emergency care services; and implementing changes to the funding and targets systems for emergency department attendances and acute admissions.
President of the College of Emergency Medicine, Dr Clifford Mann said: “The College of Emergency Medicine has been pressing for action to tackle the challenges facing the acute and emergency care system.
“If we are to avoid an annual crisis and build a resilient system it is vital that the 13 recommendations within this unique document are implemented. No plans for acute and emergency care should be developed without reference to these consensus recommendations. It would be nothing short of a scandal if these recommendations were not acted on.”
In addition to the provision of out-of-hours family doctors, there should also be other health and social care workers physically located in emergency departments to bridge the gap between GP, hospital and social care services in order to support vulnerable patients.
Dr Stephanie Smith of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, said: “Emergency departments are being put under increased pressure as staff are faced with growing numbers of patients who are either unable to access out of hours care or who see emergency departments as the ‘go-to’ for all health complaints.”
Heather Strawbridge, chair of the NHS Confederation's Urgent and Emergency Care Forum, told NHE: “Building resilience across the system is better than planning for a crisis. This requires both national strategic direction and local action.
“In turn, this requires meaningful engagement with local communities, patient and public empowerment and adequate support for multi-professional teams, drawing on the contribution of frontline clinicians in all organisations from ambulance services to primary care.”
(Image: c. Rui Vieira/PA Wire/Press Association)
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