Almost one in ten GP practices earned maximum points from last year’s Quality and Outcomes Framework according to data published today.
Statistics released by the Information Centre show that GPs increased their average performance in the second year of the QoF by nearly 5% with the average practice earning 1011 points out of the possible 1050. The number of practices earning maximum points rose from 220 last year to 813 in 2005/6. A total of 8409 practices, covering more than 99% of patients in England, took part in the QoF.
However, exception reporting figures which have been collected for the first time year, and which will show how many patients practices have excluded from each target group, have not been published yet.
A spokesperson for the Information Centre told EHI Primary Care that the data had not yet been extracted from the Quality Management and Analysis System (QMAS), the payment software for QoF, but would be published some time in 2006/7.
She added: “Extraction of the data is pending agreement with the other three countries about the specification for doing so.”
Dr Gavin Jamie, a GP in Wiltshire who maintains his own online database of QoF results, said publishing data at practice-level could be difficult for some indicators because the numbers of patients involved were low and patient confidentiality could be threatened.
“It’s generally accepted that if there’s less than five or six patients you are starting to get confidentiality problems.”
However Dr Jamie said publication of exception rates in some form would be useful as it would allow practices to compare their own exception reporting against the average.
This year’s publication of the QoF results in England includes a patient-friendly site designed to enable patients to easily access their own practice’s results, compare them with last year’s results and compare both against other practices in the local area and against national scores.
Dr Jamie added: “Eighteen months ago they weren’t even going to publish the results centrally but the level of information coming out this year is very detailed and easy to access.”
Performance over the key areas of the QoF has improved in year two of the scheme. GPs earned 96% of the available points this year, compared to 91% in 2004/5 with 20% of practices earning maximum points from the clinical domain, worth 550 points, compared to 7% in 2004/5.
The Department of Health said each practice would receive an average of £125,900 as a result of their QoF achievement.
Health minister Lord Warner said practices were to be congratulated for their perofmrance. He added: “Practices are getting paid more because GPs and their staff are working harder and smarter. We should remember that the extra advice and support offered to patients on prevention will save people from potentially life threatening conditions and will reduce demands for emergency hospital care.
“By encouraging all GPs to advise patients on how to stop smoking and help tackle blood pressure or cholesterol they will save the NHS money in the long-term in terms of the more expensive treatments for serious conditions that are likely to develop. These changes are all part of bringing services closer to patients.”
Dr Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the British Medical Association’s General Practitioner Committee, said the reuslts were great news for patients.
He added: “The UK leads the world in having a national system which encourages and rewards general practice teams for providing top quality care, looking after patients in ways that reflect the best medical evidence of what actually works. Achieving such high scores is not easy. Practices have pulled out all the stops and worked extremely hard to get these results. In real terms it means a lot of patients have better health outlooks than ever before.”
Disease prevalence data was also released by the Information Centre today. National prevalence rates for hypertension rose from 11.3% in 2004/5 to 12% in 2005/6 with the highest rate (14%) in Dorset and Somerset and the lowest in north central London (10%).
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