Primary Care GP Access - July 2016 Report

Aims

1. To ascertain whether it was easy or difficult for local patients to book an appointment with their GP during core GP opening hours (a) for a routine appointment and (b) for an urgent (or on the day) appointment.
2. To find out from patients whether it was difficult or not to make the time to attend their GP surgery between 9am and 5pm from Monday to Friday.
3. To identify from local patients what their preference for booking a routine appointment would be, if the working hours of GP practices were to be extended. In other words, local respondents were asked to identify which option for a routine appointment they would select out of three possible options that could be made available.

Methodology

A sample of 2,500 local patients were surveyed about primary care GP access across Hounslow’s five localities by Healthwatch Hounslow (HWH) staff and volunteers, comprising about 500 patients in each locality.

The survey method was a questionnaire in English that Hounslow CCG prepared. In addition to English-speaking patients, HWH obtained responses from a number of respondents whose first language was not English.

To include people of diverse age groups and abilities, HWH also accessed members of groups like Hounslow’s Disability Community Forum and the Parent Carers’ Forum for assistance.