NDUC
Sector: Health | Project: Understanding needs for new public services
‘Northern Doctors Urgent Care’, NDUC organisation is not-for-profit and the services they provide employ a large number of doctors, nurses and other health professionals. The organisation has a track record of successfully delivering out-of-hours urgent care services in in the North.
Historically individual GP practices are responsible for making sure services are available for patients who need to see a doctor or nurse when their surgery is closed. However, increasingly PCT’s (Primary Care Trusts) are taking over this responsibility and are managing out-of-hours services through contracts with third party suppliers.
think M. delivered research to investigate the needs and current provision
of out of hours urgent care in all Northern Primary Care Trusts operating from North Yorkshire to the Scottish Borders. Key outputs included feedback on current contract arrangements, perceived quality of service, opportunities for service enhancement, contracted service cost structures, payment rates for clinicians and contract renewal dates.
Further to this, the team has investigated trends across the whole of the UK given the convergence of primary care trusts. The results were used to inform service marketing and communications strategy, PCT targeting, service positioning and regional partnering for tenders.
