Trinity Medical Centre saves money using Patient Partner

Trinity Medical Centre is a small, semi rural practice located in the Staffordshire village of Blythe Bridge, a few miles south east of Stoke on Trent and close to the major traffic routes of the A50 and M6. The centre employs two GPs, two practice nurses and eight additional staff who work in a range of clinical and administrative roles. There are 4,200 patients registered at the surgery, drawn from a predominantly white middle class demographic.

Like many GP practices across the UK, Trinity Medical Centre experienced a high volume of phone call traffic at certain times of the day, particularly when the surgery first opened in the morning. In an effort to reduce call congestion and improve overall access for patients, senior management at the centre decided to implement an automated appointments service, with Patient Partner first going live at the practice in September 2009.

Practice Manager Sue Bryan explains the reasons behind opting for the Patient Partner system. “We wanted to install an automated service because our telephones were always extremely busy first thing in the morning, every day of the week.  We thought that if our patients were able to book and cancel their own appointments whenever it suited them, it would remove some of pressure from the early morning staff. We also hoped it would make the telephones less busy, which would be less frustrating for patients.

“Having had a full demonstration from the sales team which clearly explained everything, we felt confident about going ahead,” comments Sue. Fortunately this confidence was not misplaced and the system has lived up to expectations. “Whilst we have had a few minor teething problems as we adapted the system for our particular requirements, it has enabled us to greatly improve our service. Not only that, but our staff now feel less pressured and are able to cope much better in the mornings.”

Most importantly, the reaction from patients has been very positive, with most expressing the opinion that Patient Partner is a good idea. “Patients find the system easy to use and have adapted well to it,” says Sue “They are now able to make their own appointments without going via reception, saving a lot of time and frustration.”

Patient Partner’s top three features:

1. It makes the telephones less busy.

2. Patients can pre book their appointments.

3. It handles out of hours calls and directs patients to the out of hours service.

Patient Partner has helped to improve several key areas of surgery life, including the main aim of reducing call congestion, particularly at the traditionally busy times. It has also achieved the objective of making life easier for the receptionists by reducing the number of calls that they need to answer, thereby releasing time to concentrate on other tasks. “Our patients also say that they find it easier to contact the surgery since the system has been installed,” comments Sue. “In fact, using Patient Partner has really enhanced our overall call handling capabilities.”

Sue has nothing but praise for the system and would be happy to recommend it to any other surgery looking to resolve their call handling issues. “I think the system is very good and can’t think of anything else which needs to be done to improve it. Whenever we have had any issues, they have been resolved quickly by the support team: they have offered us a good level of support and we have always been able to speak to someone when we have needed to.  Generally, Patient Partner has made the reception a much calmer place and receptionists have time to do other things.  Our patients are able to book appointments in advance and out of hours 24/7 so this frees up the telephones – and it has also saved us money by not having to install another telephone line. I would advise any surgery considering installing the system to go for it. Not only am I happy to recommend it to others- I have already done so!”

Patient Partner gives White Medical Group ‘the best of both worlds’

White Medical Group is located just outside the border of Newcastle upon Tyne and consists of three sites: the main surgery is located in the village of Ponteland, with branch sites at Wylam and Stamfordham. The practice employs 6 doctors, 2 nurses and 19 admin staff for a patient list of just under 7,000 residents in total. With the three surgeries covering a large geographical area which includes both urban and rural communities, the patient demographic is varied.

The demands made on a modern GP practice are steadily increasing, and whilst the number of reception staff at White Medical Group had remained constant for some years, their workload was continually rising. The partners and practice manager decided that installing an automated phone appointment booking system could be one way of reducing this pressure, and so went live with their Patient Partner system in October 2009.

Although Patient Partner is installed at over 600 surgeries nationwide (with that number steadily rising), there were no surgeries in the area using Patient Partner at that time. This meant that the practice manager James Young was unable to see the system working in situ prior to installation.

“Although Voice Connect’s demonstration was very good, we weren’t certain that the reality would live up to it,” James explains. “We couldn’t go and see the system in action in a real surgery which made it hard to uncover any flaws, so it felt like a bit of a leap in the dark to have the system installed, particularly in relation to the integration with our clinical and phone systems.”

However, these concerns proved to be unfounded, and whilst it took a little adjustment to integrate the system with EMIS during installation, once installed everything has run efficiently. “Voice Connect ironed out the inevitable teething issues very quickly,” comments James. “Since going live we haven’t had any problems at all.  Everything has worked reliably – in fact, I have been very impressed with Voice Connect’s level of support.”

James also reports that the system has been well received by the majority of patients at the surgery and that uptake has steadily increased as patients become more familiar with Patient Partner. “Generally elderly patients can take a while to get used to the technology, but this has become easier with time,” he explains. “There was some initial concern that we would force people to use the service, but this was never going to be the case. The system is great and we find that once a patient has used it they never go back to the old system of ringing a receptionist. Some patients will always prefer speaking to a real person, so we have the best of both worlds by having both options. We plan to extend our marketing efforts with help from Voice Connect in order to continue increasing patient usage still further.”

Patient Partner’s best three features are:

1. The integration between the phone system and the clinical system.
2. The stability of the IT platform.
3. The ability to book appointments at any time which has also reduced receptionist workload.

James reports that Patient Partner has had a positive impact on call handling and general communication at all the surgeries, reducing call congestion, particularly at peak call times. The system has freed up time for receptionists, whilst making it easier for patients to contact the surgery. “The system has enabled us to monitor how we handle calls and make further improvements by providing useful statistics which allow phone usage to be closely monitored,” he adds.

“Our experience of Patient Partner has generally been very positive and if a surgery similar to ours was considering installing the system, I‘d advise them to go for it as it’s definitely worthwhile if you want to take some of the existing workload pressure off reception staff. Prior to installation, it’s worth thinking about how you market the service and how you maximise patient usage. Whilst Patient Partner isn’t cheap, it does provide good value for money. In fact, overall it’s an excellent system that does exactly what it says on the tin.”

Telecoms firm solving a ‘very real problem’ for patients says MP Stephen Dorrell

The Chair of the Health Select Committee, the Rt. Hon Stephen Dorrell MP, visited Voice Connect to see for himself the automated telephone appointment booking system it provides for GPs’ practices.  Mr Dorrell visited the offices to learn more about how the company is working with GPs to improve patient access and reduce call congestion. The system, known as Patient Partner, is installed in over 600 GP practices across the UK.

The company’s board members met with Mr Dorrell during his 90 minute tour of the premises.  Voice Connect MD Stefan Olsberg was delighted to meet with the MP and have the opportunity to discuss the Government’s health plans.  “Mr Dorrell was able to tell us about his personal experiences of booking doctors’ appointments.  He seemed genuinely impressed by the time and cost savings that Patient Partner can offer GPs,” comments Mr Olsberg. “He was clearly aware of the issues surrounding both small businesses and the health sector and spoke with a refreshing honesty about both.”

Elected as Chair of the Health Select Committee in 2010, Mr Dorrell comments “Voice Connect is an interesting example of a company that is solving a very real problem; in their case problems around booking GP appointments by using technology.  During our meeting I learned a great deal about the lengths that they have gone to in working with clinical databases, practice managers and patients.  The result is that they appear to have created a product that saves money for practice managers and enhances the service available to patients.”

Voice Connect celebrated its 20^th year in business earlier in 2011.  The company also works with universities, police forces and local authorities across the UK. Most recently, the company has started developing mobile phone apps as well as continuing to extend its larger scale telecoms products.

Mr Dorrell visited the Voice Connect offices on Thursday 5th May and met the directors and key staff who demonstrated some of the company’s latest hi-tech developments.

Hundreds of thousands of staff who work on their own (commonly known as lone workers) could find themselves protected by a new mobile phone app specifically designed to keep them safe.  The Lone Worker app from has been launched this week on the Nokia, Apple and Windows platforms.

The device allows lone workers to set a remote alarm on their mobile phone so that if they are not out of a meeting or in a location by a pre-planned time, a colleague will be notified that something may have gone awry.  In addition, the lone worker’s movements can also be traced online using a GPS signal sent from their phone.  “Regular signals sent from the phone are transmitted so that the whereabouts of the worker can be traced to within a few metres of their last signal and can be viewed on a Google Maps aerial view of the location,” explains Voice Connect’s Technical Director David Harrison. “Previous known locations can also be seen so that help can be quickly dispatched if required.”

Voice Connect first created a product to help lone workers almost a decade ago and their systems have proved popular with NHS trusts, utility companies and councils.  But until now smaller organisation such as estate agents, GPs or companies with a mobile external sales force have been unable to use such systems because of the number of users needed to make them viable.

“This new mobile app really changes things,” comments Voice Connect’s MD Stefan Olsberg. “It means that any organisation, large or small, can have a robust system in place to protect staff who work on their own away from the office. They are amongst the most vulnerable employees in the community, but now their location can be monitored and checked, with help sent on its way within seconds.”

Warrington is a large industrial town with over 190.000 residents located between Manchester and Liverpool. The town’s borough council has a proactive Trading Standards department whose mission is ‘to promote a fair and safe trading environment’. This remit includes ensuring that traders describe goods accurately, that safety standards are met, that products are priced properly and that all legal requirements are fulfilled. The department also provides an advice service for members of the public who have purchased goods or services that they are unhappy with, offering guidance on what action can be taken.

In 2004, the authority set up iCAN (the Consumer Alert Network) to tackle illegal trading practices taking place in the local area.  Central to the success of this venture was the facility to open up lines of communication, enabling large numbers of the public to be contacted quickly. So, in addition to the quarterly ‘iCAN’ newsletter sent out to members, the authority needed the facility to issue regular updates and warnings to targeted groups at short notice.

After some research into the options available, Voice Connect’s VC Relay system was installed that same year. This system, used by police forces and Neighbourhood Watch schemes across the UK, enabled the network to quickly send out large numbers of messages to their database members via text, voicemail or e-mail.

Roger Mapleson, Consumer and Business Protection Manager for Warrington and Halton Trading Standards, explains how use of the system has grown since it was first installed. “We now have over 3,700 residents on the iCAN database using VC Relay to communicate with us and each other,” he says. “We have worked hard to establish relationships within the community, specifically with residents in the more deprived areas of the borough. We have been really pleased with the positive uptake of the scheme.”

So successful has the iCAN initiative with VC Relay been, that the neighbouring Halton Trading Standards Authority has joined with Warrington. “Staff at Halton work closely with us, using VC Relay and the model of the original iCAN scheme,” explains Roger. “They have direct access to our server and are able to operate VC Relay from their own PCs.” The additional revenue that this raised also enabled Warrington TS to upgrade the system. Trafford Metropolitan Borough also signed up to the system last year and are now building and developing their own iCAN using the system.

VC Relay is regularly used to warn people about various scams, doorstep crimes and illegal practices which go on in the town, as well as giving members relevant consumer advice. Two examples of recent incidents in which Warrington TS successfully used VC Relay to notify the public include the apprehension of the owner of a bogus damp proofing company which had been operating in the Cheshire region for over 10 years and the arrest of those responsible for a sham charity collection. In the first example, the use of VC Relay enabled Warrington TS to alert iCAN members to the damp proofing scam as soon as the company started cold calling and leafleting. In the second example, an iCAN member alerted the organisation to their suspicions about a clothing collection, allegedly by a national charity. The collections were monitored by TS staff and found to be bogus, resulting in an arrest.

VC Relay’s best three features according to Warrington Trading Standards:

1. The system is easy to use.
2. It has fantastic power to communicate, reassure and educate.
3. It makes it easy for members to feedback to us.

Based on the success with VC Relay, Warrington Borough Council have recently installed Voice Connect’s Lone Worker system which protects workers on site visits or those who work alone. As the council already had the core component of the VCII hub, adding the Lone Worker system was an economically sound decision. The system is currently being piloted by a section of staff in the authority.

Roger is very positive about the whole experience of using VC Relay and the impact that it has had on the iCAN initiative. “Voice Connect has been an excellent company to work with. They are constantly innovating and coming up with new solutions and have always sorted out any technical glitches quickly. We have every confidence in them as a company and VC Relay as a product and are happy to recommend them to other local authorities. Good communication is the cornerstone of iCAN’s success – VC Relay has played a significant part in enabling us to take our message out into the wider community.”

Patient Partner gives White Medical Group ‘the best of both worlds’

White Medical Group is located just outside the border of Newcastle upon Tyne and consists of three sites: the main surgery is located in the village of Ponteland, with branch sites at Wylam and Stamfordham. The practice employs 6 doctors, 2 nurses and 19 admin staff for a patient list of just under 7,000 residents in total. With the three surgeries covering a large geographical area which includes both urban and rural communities, the patient demographic is varied.

The demands made on a modern GP practice are steadily increasing, and whilst the number of reception staff at White Medical Group had remained constant for some years, their workload was continually rising. The partners and practice manager decided that installing an automated phone appointment booking system could be one way of reducing this pressure, and so went live with their Patient Partner system in October 2009.

Although Patient Partner is installed at over 600 surgeries nationwide (with that number steadily rising), there were no surgeries in the area using Patient Partner at that time. This meant that the practice manager James Young was unable to see the system working in situ prior to installation.

“Although Voice Connect’s demonstration was very good, we weren’t certain that the reality would live up to it,” James explains. “We couldn’t go and see the system in action in a real surgery which made it hard to uncover any flaws, so it felt like a bit of a leap in the dark to have the system installed, particularly in relation to the integration with our clinical and phone systems.”

However, these concerns proved to be unfounded, and whilst it took a little adjustment to integrate the system with EMIS during installation, once installed everything has run efficiently. “Voice Connect ironed out the inevitable teething issues very quickly,” comments James. “Since going live we haven’t had any problems at all.  Everything has worked reliably – in fact, I have been very impressed with Voice Connect’s level of support.”

James also reports that the system has been well received by the majority of patients at the surgery and that uptake has steadily increased as patients become more familiar with Patient Partner. “Generally elderly patients can take a while to get used to the technology, but this has become easier with time,” he explains. “There was some initial concern that we would force people to use the service, but this was never going to be the case. The system is great and we find that once a patient has used it they never go back to the old system of ringing a receptionist. Some patients will always prefer speaking to a real person, so we have the best of both worlds by having both options. We plan to extend our marketing efforts with help from Voice Connect in order to continue increasing patient usage still further.”

Patient Partner’s best three features are:

1. The integration between the phone system and the clinical system.
2. The stability of the IT platform.
3. The ability to book appointments at any time which has also reduced receptionist workload.

James reports that Patient Partner has had a positive impact on call handling and general communication at all the surgeries, reducing call congestion, particularly at peak call times. The system has freed up time for receptionists, whilst making it easier for patients to contact the surgery. “The system has enabled us to monitor how we handle calls and make further improvements by providing useful statistics which allow phone usage to be closely monitored,” he adds.

“Our experience of Patient Partner has generally been very positive and if a surgery similar to ours was considering installing the system, I‘d advise them to go for it as it’s definitely worthwhile if you want to take some of the existing workload pressure off reception staff. Prior to installation, it’s worth thinking about how you market the service and how you maximise patient usage. Whilst Patient Partner isn’t cheap, it does provide good value for money. In fact, overall it’s an excellent system that does exactly what it says on the tin.”

Survey shows that 92% of GP practice managers think call centres will be bad for patients

A survey of 763 practice managers from across the UK has shown that 91.5% are opposed to the Government’s proposal to use external call centres to handle patient calls.  A similar number feel that a move to call centres will do nothing to improve patient experience. The survey was conducted last week by Voice Connect and IMC Research, and was sent out to practice managers across England, Wales and Scotland.

Participants were asked if they felt that a call centre would offer a better service for patients than calling in to their own reception. Only 3.5% said that they thought it would be an improvement, whilst the majority of respondents cited three key areas of concern. These were the importance of the relationship between patient and practice, the complexity of technical integration and the issue of patient confidentiality. Only 2.6% thought that patients would welcome the idea of contacting a call centre rather than the practice, with particular concerns raised about how the elderly would cope.

When given the choice of telephoning a call centre or using their existing GP number, only 1.7% of practice managers thought patients would ‘obey the rules’ and use the call centre – with the majority suggesting that patients would still call to speak to their GP practice directly.

“The vast majority of practice managers clearly think that this scheme is unworkable, unwanted and unnecessary,” comments Voice Connect’s MD Stefan Olsberg.  “We have never seen such conclusive results from a survey that we have conducted.  Their comments have been almost universally negative about these proposals, expressing scepticism over the practicality of the scheme and the possibility that it would actually save any money.”

There are already lower cost ways that surgeries can use to improve patient communication such as the automated telephone appointment booking system known as Patient Partner. This enables patients to book, cancel or re-arrange appointments out of normal hours and speak to their GPs receptionist when they are open.

“Systems like Patient Partner have been proven to enhance patient satisfaction, offer better access and reduce costs,” explains Olsberg.  “The Government should consider alternatives before embarking down this expensive and counterproductive route.”

Patient Partner from Voice Connect has been specially designed for GPs’ surgeries. Patients telephone the surgery as usual and select the appropriate option on their telephone. The automated system detects spaces in the doctors’ diaries and allows the patient to choose the appointment time which best suits them by pressing a button on their touch tone phone. This means that they no longer have to speak to a receptionist or call during surgery hours and the system is updated constantly in real time.

Patients order repeat prescriptions by telephone even when the surgery is closed

A new service which enables patients to order repeat prescriptions by telephone even when the practice is closed has been launched last month (February). The service has been developed by unified communications company Voice Connect, who supply the automated telephone appointment booking system known as Patient Partner to around 600 GPs’ surgeries across the UK.

The system works by offering the caller a series of automated options to order their prescription. To ensure that absolute confidentiality is maintained, patients can only access the service by entering a PIN number. The new module currently integrates with clinical software providers TPP’s SystmOne software, which is installed at many practices across the UK.

“We developed our repeat prescription service because it was requested by so many of our customers,” explains Stefan Olsberg, Managing Director of Voice Connect. “Our clients tell us that Patient Partner has dramatically reduced the workload on reception. Now, with the new repeat prescription service, we have removed another pressured area of work that uses up reception time and resources. In fact, interest has been so high that we are offering the solution not just as part of Patient Partner, but also as a standalone service.”

Many practices no longer take repeat prescriptions over the phone due to the amount of work involved.  As the new service removes the need for patients to deal with a receptionist, the system frees up reception staff to attend to other practice duties whilst also freeing up telephone lines for emergency calls. It also offers improved access and flexibility for patients.

“Patient access is an important issue for GP practices; in order to improve the patient experience, surgeries have had to look for ways to become more flexible and offer patients increased choice – including how and when they contact the practice for appointments and essential services,” adds Mr Olsberg. “All of these developments recognise the fact that, as patients lead increasingly busy lives, access to their GP services must be more flexible.”

Andrew Leece, Clinical Systems Analyst for TPP who also supply SystmOnline which allows patients to manage appointments and order repeat prescriptions 24 hours a day via the internet, is delighted at the new product integration. “We’re really pleased to be working with Patient Partner. This development gives our users the ability to offer even more flexibility to their patients and the fact that the repeat prescriptions service works exclusively with SystmOne is fantastic.”

GP Magazine reports that Dr Gerada has said it has become clear that GPs would be responsible for delivering most of the £20 billion DoH efficiency savings target.

‘I understood these reforms were about putting GPs at the centre of planning healthcare for their patients, not about making sweeping cuts, which will include shutting hospitals, making enormous redundancies, closing services,’ she said.

‘But I think it’s going to be very obvious now that GPs’ role, certainly in the first few years, is about cutting services.’

The need to make savings would force GPs to focus on cuts, not redesigning services, Dr Gerada said. They face tough decisions, she added. ‘This is not about keeping patients away from their first outpatient appointment.

‘This is about noticing and planning how many neonatal cots we need, how many surgical procedures are carried out, what the cap is on funding for certain emergency services.’

Dr Gerada said delivering the full weight of the efficiency challenge will be an ‘enormous responsibility’ for GPs.

Patient Partner from Voice Connect was introduced to improve patient choice whilst reducing administration costs.

Concerns expressed over NHS reforms

Dr Trevor Fernandes, chairman of GPs organisation Dacorum has expressed concern about massive changes to the NHS that will see budgets handed to GPs. His concerns are around the added workload and he questions the desire of GPs to take on managerial roles and their ability to operate within budgets.

He has spoken out as the government announces a new wave of ‘pathfinder’ GP groupings, which will act as precursors to the consortia that will eventually take control of 80 per cent of health budgets.

Among the new groupings is Herts Valleys Commissioning Consortium, which covers west Herts and includes the ‘vast majority’ of GP surgeries in Dacorum.

Dr Fernandes, who led the borough’s surgeries into the consortium, said: “Theoretically it’s very good. There are a number of issues which make it a bit worrying.

“My view of the groundswell of GPs is most of them have trained in order to consult with patients, and that’s what they feel most comfortable doing.”

He said the system of commissioning care for patients would not fundamentally change under the shake-up, so a body of administrators and managers would still be required. “Until that system changes I don’t see how you can get rid of 55 per cent of managers,” Dr Fernandes said.

“In view of our local overspends this doesn’t seem to be an attractive thing to take on. It feels like the government is pressing it on us with a budget that is unlikely to work so they can point at us and say: ‘It’s your fault’.

“I’m not saying it’s impossible. I would say the reason we have signed up is because we wish for financial and educational support to find our way forward and come up with the best structure locally.”