Londonwide LMCs

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to present our latest newsletter, which highlights the recent work and collaborative efforts Harrow LMC and Londonwide LMCs along with other local partners.

Harrow LMC Membership and contact information.

Drop-in session for Harrow constituents

Harrow LMC is taking every opportunity to help commissioners and other local health and social care partners understand the immense pressure general practice is under. The LMC are eager to hear from you and the challenges you are facing. This will provide evidence that general practice needs more financial and organisational support, if it is to deliver the quality of care that it desperately wants to, and what our patients truly deserve.

Harrow LMC are pleased to introduce virtual drop-in-sessions, with the first being on Tuesday 3 December 1 – 2pm which you should have received a teams invite to, but can be joined by this link. All practices are welcome to attend and have direct discussion with LMC members on matters that really affect you and is an opportunity for us to support you.

What has Harrow LMC been working on recently?

Safe Working:

Primary/Secondary Care Interface – A tremendous amount of work at a Local and NWL Level to push back on the inappropriate workload dumping that is taking place on General Practice and building effective relationships with trusts to resolve issues. Please do share any examples that you have.
Raising concerns over shared care pathways and new ADHD provisions. Practices are not obliged to take over the prescribing of such patients, especially where there are no shared care agreements in place. This work is NOT mandatory. We have met with Harrow Health and the Commissioners to express our concerns; we are due to meet with the Commissioners again in December for an update of the concerns we raised.
Pushing for a cleanse of referral forms and ensuring those available are current including the correct pathways. NWL IT team can assist practices with local form cleansing.

Stabilisation:

The LMC continues to work with the ICB regarding unfunded or inappropriate work. Some examples include asking GPs to arrange further investigations, onward referrals, prescribing specialist medication without shared care, and increased monitoring of patients to stabilise medication. Your practice does not have to accept inappropriate requests. Please see the template letter which can be used to reject this work using the template letter here.
Providing feedback and reviewing specifications for the in-year specification changes for the current Single Offer Enhanced Services, such as concerns about NDPP provider referrals, MDT working, Medicines management and Hypertension.
Working with NWL ICB IT team to ensure the care plan for Diabetes Health Check template pre-populates which has since been resolved.
Ongoing work for the Same Day Access Proposals 24/25. A challenging 9 months, 50p has been released for engagement and the £2 for phase 2 has just been released, we have reservations about the ask to demonstrate value for money with an increase in 10% activity – the LMC were not asked to contribute to this metric.

Attrition:

Building relationships with key stakeholders including Healthwatch, The Local Pharmacy Committee and PCN CD’s including monthly meetings with PCN CD’s.
Attending Harrow specific and wider NWL meetings to ensure on the ground GP’s are represented within the new ways of working following the recent transformation of the ICB and Borough team.

Harrow LMC has vacancies
Harrow LMC currently has 5 vacancies on the committee, and it is important that your LMC is representative of the whole profession. We would value representation from all types of Harrow GPs, regardless of your role, to enable us to better support, represent and advocate for you. It would be fantastic if each PCN could be represented on the committee.

As a committee we are keen to provide support and guidance for all categories of local GPs and their practices on a range of issues, including contractual, partnership, estates, performance and other issues. We also provide advice and support to navigate GPs on the GP Contract as well as Enhanced Services. We have built a strong relationship with Harrow ICB, which we continue to build on and our Chair & Vice Chair attends meetings with NWL ICB for wider NWL issues.

We look forward to welcoming you on Tuesday 3 December to the drop in, this is an opportunity for you to learn more about what your LMC does and how you may be able to contribute.

GP Support Team
The GP Support team provides expert, confidential and bespoke advice and support to individual constituent GPs and practices in difficulties. – Contact: [email protected].

Resources available

London General Practice Awards
We have already had more than 100 nominations for the inaugural awards that are being run by Londonwide LMCs. Thank you to those who have submitted nominations, if you have not already nominated yourself and/or a colleague then please do so by Saturday.

Get in touch!
All constituents can raise any issues of concern with the LMC at any time and thank you to those that have been in touch since the last newsletter. We rely on you to know where support is needed and are grateful for your queries. Please do reach out to LMC members or Amy. We are keen to hear from our local GPs and practice teams about any issues you are facing. We are here to represent your views. Please feel free to contact [email protected].

Yours faithfully,

Dr Chaand Nagpaul, Chair – Harrow LMC

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