Urgent and emergency care is the range of healthcare services available to people who need medical advice, diagnosis and/or treatment quickly and unexpectedly.
This stakeholder engagement exercise invites thoughts and opinions on proposals to extend non-medical prescribing responsibilities to paramedic practitioners. The exercise will help to shape a formal consultation later in the year, which will ultimately inform recommendations to Government Ministers on whether to extend prescribing to paramedics.
In May 2009 the Department of Health commissioned the Primary Care Foundation to study the impact of using primary care within or alongside A&E. The report highlights that use of primary care clinicians in A&E departments can benefit patients where services are integrated and clinicians work together. The findings of this study are now available in a report on the Primary Care Foundation's website.
The findings of this report are being developed into a guide for commissioners on use of primary care clinicians with A&E departments and this guide will be available soon.
This report will be of interest to NHS chief executives and their commissioning colleagues.
Published: 4 February 2010
In June 2009, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) began an investigation into the provision of out-of-hours primary care services in five PCTs by Take Care Now (TCN). The CQC’s enquiry was prompted by the tragic death of a patient in February 2008 after he was administered 100mg of diamorphine by a locum doctor from Germany. In October 2009, the CQC issued an interim statement on this investigation, which prompted David Colin-Thomé to write to PCTs, and the Minister of State for Health, Mike O’Brien, to ask us to jointly lead a short piece of work to review the local commissioning and provision of out-of-hours services.
Published: 13 October 2009
This toolkit has been produced by a group of ambulance providers and primary care trust commissioners together with the Department of Health to offer practical analysis, worksheets and tools to help all commissioners and providers improve urgent and emergency care services through better understanding of the factors affecting significant rises in 999 demand.
Published: 21 October 2009
The Emergency Services Review, commissioned by the strategic health authorities, has completed its work to undertake a review of recent performance and support the identification and adoption of best practice. The Emergency Care Intensive Support Team, established by the review, is now supporting the implementation of this guidance, hosting events and supporting organisations to deliver the outcomes outlined in the documents. The aim of this work has been to ensure that local health economies continue to provide resilient, sustainable and integrated emergency and urgent care arrangements. The ESR Team have issued a series of supporting best practice documentation, guides and toolkits.
Urgent and Emergency Care Policy Team, New King’s Beam House, 22 Upper Ground, London SE1 9BW
