The Department of Heath is being urged to make a decision on the use of 084 telephone numbers in GP practices by those campaigning to ban the numbers and those backing the retention of such telephone systems.
However, the company which supplies more than 95% of such systems, NEG Surgery Line, has claimed that the DH is “highly unlikely” to ban the numbers but says GP practices are delaying a decision to sign up while the DH considers the issue.
The DH told PCTs in March that it was looking into the use of 084 telephone numbers following concerns about their use and hoped to decide whether further guidance was needed by the end of March.
However no announcement has been made despite pressure from both NEG Surgery Line and continued attempts to get the numbers banned, including a 28,579 signature e-petition to the Prime Minister.
This week the DH said the investigation was still continuing. A spokesperson for the DH told EHI Primary Care: “The Department is currently gathering evidence on the use of 084 numbers, and will consider what further action is necessary in light of that evidence.
"Ministers believe that decisions about local services are best taken locally, where the local situation and local priorities are best understood. NHS organisations have a duty to ensure that they provide the best possible service to their local populations, and it is for the NHS locally to consider what is in their patients’ best interests. However, the Department has made it clear that it does not expect patients to have to pay more than the cost of a local call."
Campaigner David Hickson argues that patients pay more to call surgeries using 084 numbers compared to practices using local numbers and are effectively subsidising the cost of practice telephone systems, in breach of the NHS pledge that care should be free at the point of need. Part of the profit made on use of 084 numbers is used by NEG Surgery Line to pay for the cost of more advanced telephone systems in practices which the company argues provide a more efficient and better service for patients.
Kath Simons, spokesperson for NEG Surgery Line, told EHI primary Care: “The over-riding fundamental factor is that Surgery Line does work, the vast majority of patients prefer to use it due to the improved access and that practices love it – 1300 practices would not be wrong.”
Simons said the company was pushing the DH to come to a conclusion as it had “tens of practices” wishing to use Surgery Line but hesitant to do so because they were being advised to put their plans on hold by PCTs.
Hickson argues that the DH, NHS bodies, GPs and the telephone suppliers should recognise that patients should not be asked to pay towards the cost of providing NHS services and that other ways should be found to fund necessary service improvements.
He added: “Use of revenue sharing telephone numbers must cease. Proper methods of funding to be applied to new installations could be adapted to enable existing installations to return to compliance. All parties should engage positively with the Department of Health to devise ways in which this can be achieved.”
He also claimed that there was “ample evidence” that delegating the issue to local level had not worked.
He added: “Is the DH really saying that the NHS can be "free at the point of need" in some parts of the UK, but not in others – I think not. PCTs do not have sufficient democratic accountability to make so significant and political a decision.”
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Links
DH letter: Use of ‘084’ telephone numbers by local NHS services