COVID-19 Operational guidance: Practice resilience

Pulse Intelligence summarises NHS England operational guidance on the contingency plans that partners and practice managers should adopt in their locality.

The advice is part of operational guidance from NHS England, the latest version of which was published on 6 April.

The key points on practice resilience are:

• Establish which practices are going to work together as part of any escalation response to maximise clinical capacity and support business continuity.
• Appoint a clinical and managerial lead (and deputies) who will oversee and manage any difficulties including reporting/escalation to CCGs in line with local processes. The role of the clinical and managerial leads is to ensure local mitigating actions are identified and taken in response to capacity concerns. A key enabler will be ensuring that staff can access GP computer systems from locations other than their usual or base location. This will facilitate remote consultations and administration.
• Appoint a clinical and managerial lead (and deputies) who will oversee and manage any difficulties including reporting/escalation to CCGs in line with local processes.
• Ensure a baseline number of clinical staff, administrative staff and others including part-time and full-time members.
• Establish a daily reporting system mechanism for your workforce issues (sickness absence, home isolation) – some national tools will soon be available to support.
• Ensure the directory of services is kept up to date with any significant changes to services as this is important for NHS 111 pathways.
• CCG and/or commissioning support unit (CSU) to support shared access administration, GP Connect, and continue to support enabling remote working for more staff.
• CCG/CSU to help co-ordinate personal protective equipment (PPE) for practices. 

Source: NHS England Guidance and standard operational procedures – General practice in the context of coronavirus (COVID-19). Version 2.1. [6 April 2020]