GP practices in Scotland have increased their performance under the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QoF) this year, earning 1026 points out of a possible 1050 points available.
The achievement, worth approximately £128,000 for a practice with average list size and disease prevalence, means Scottish practices have earned more than 97% of the points available this year compared to 92% last year when the average score in Scotland was 971. The total QoF payments to practices in Scotland for 2005/6 were £134.5 million.
The online publication of the QOF figures today means Scotland is the first of the four UK countries to publish its annual QoF data, as it was last year.
Dr Mary Church, joint chairman of the British Medical Association’s Scottish GP committee, said the figures showed that for the second year running GPs were delivering high quality care to their patients.
She added: “It is proof that investment in general practice delivers value for money and improvements to care. The resources that accompany these quality points on the framework bring results which benefit patients and deliver high quality NHS care."
The data, which includes practice-by-practice results for 1020 practices as well as data at NHS board and national level, also includes prevalence data for the ten diseases areas in the clinical domain. Most of the prevalence rates have stayed at around the same level as last year with only hypertension rising significantly from 11.5% in 2004/5 to 12.1% in 2005/6.
Scottish health minister Andy Kerr praised GPs’ achievements and said the QoF fitted in with the Scottish government’s vision of how care should be provided in future with more emphasis on disease prevention and health promotion.
He added: “Increased achievement levels since last year demonstrate all the hard work of practices to reach even higher standards of care.”
However both Kerr and Dr Church warned that comparisons between QoF scores for individual practices should be made with care.
Dr Church said: “A lower score does not necessarily mean that the practice is a lower quality one. For instance, a higher number of patients with certain types of disease could make the quality points more difficult to achieve, or a practice with unfilled vacancies could have the same effect."
Links
Related articles
QoF scores likely to continue to rise