Private company challenges monopoly of GPs with first contract to run medical practice
For the first time, a private company has won a contract to run a GP practice and walk-in centre, health minister Lord Warner announced last week. The deal, brokered by the Government, will allow a private company
to break the existing monopoly of independent GPs.
Care UK, a company specialising in the delivery of community and primary
care, will run a 7,000-patient GP practice and a 100-patient-per-day
walk-in centre under a contract with Barking and Dagenham Primary Care
Trust.
Making the announcement, Lord Warner said: “We made it quite clear
that where NHS patients could not rely on existing GP practices to provide
them with a good standard of service, we would turn to new providers.
This new competition can only be good news for NHS patients as it will
deliver a wider range of services open at more convenient times.”
Similar contracts are close to agreement in five other areas hardest
hit by poor access, including Hackney, Liverpool, Lancashire, Plymouth
and Yorkshire. The Department of Health says that the contracts include
plans for Saturday morning, breakfast and teatime surgeries, with practices
open as early as 7am and as late as 10pm; direct access to medical tests
and local care for diabetes, asthma and arthritis in a community setting;
and nurse and GP visitors for nursing and residential home patients.
The deal is part of a national programme — the Innovation in Primary
Care Contracting pilots — aimed at improving and expanding local
NHS services in areas where it has been difficult to recruit GPs.
Sharon Morrow, head of medicines management at Barking and Dagenham PCT,
told The Journal: “There are no plans to open a pharmacy in the
walk-in centre. There are two community pharmacies in close proximity
[so] the area is quite well served. Also, the PCT has recently approved
an application for a new pharmacy to open 100 hours per week.” |
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Pharmaceutical Journal
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