Why the urgency?
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Why the urgency? A study to investigate the considerations and actions of Out of Hours Primary Care Service Users.
IRAS ID
185502
Contact name
Sue Pender
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
City Health care Partnership
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 31 days
Research summary
The Out of Hours (OOH) Primary Care Service provides a medical and non-medical healthcare practitioner service from 18.30 hours until 08.00 hours on weekdays and all day at weekends and Public Holidays when day time GP surgeries are closed.
Patients can self-refer to the OOH service for what is advertised as access to ‘urgent medical care service’. However, the OOH service is not intended as an emergency care provider but is designed for ‘people experiencing a medical problem that cannot reasonably be expected to wait until the next opportunity to contact their own GP practice in-hours’.
Despite many initiatives within day time primary care provision to facilitate accessible and responsive service provision, the contacts for the service continue to rise with people seeking medical support during the out-of-hours period.
This research proposal has been prompted by comments from OOH staff who have indicated a perception that patients have an expectation for ‘instant’ access to healthcare treatment based on their personal choice and convenience rather than need, coupled with an unwillingness (or inability) to self-care and thus, may consider accessing the out-of-hours service as a first point of contact.
Published research studies have in the main, tended to focus upon the relationship and impacts of OOH Primary Care service provision upon hospital Emergency Departments or articles based on descriptive accounts of OOH service users’ perceptions of their care received, therefore little is known about the factors which influence peoples decisions to seek an ‘urgent medical care’ during out of hours period rather than await to see their own GP during the surgeries opening hours.
This study seeks to interview service users to explore the characteristics, motives and expectations of service users who access the OOH Primary Care service within a single OOH provider site which spans across the City of Hull.REC name
London - Brent Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/LO/1315
Date of REC Opinion
15 Jul 2015
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion