Increasing access

Before deciding to introduce an alternative to a face-to-face consultation you may wish to consider:

  • What exactly is the problem you are trying to solve?
  • Whether the use of an alternative to a face-to-face consultation is the best solution to your problem?
  • That this is not a replacement for the face to face consultation but complementary
  • An alternative to a face-to-face consultation is a learning process, it might take time to embed and could develop organically which might include finding more uses than originally expected.
  • Commercial interests are at play and people are selling products. 
  • Is this driven by the availability of funding to trial something for free? 
  • You might require support and guidance from other institutions such as the Medical Defence Organisations (MDOs) and Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) or Health Boards 

Rationale

One reason that some practices consider introducing an alternative to a face-to-face consultation is to increase access for patients, to ensure that they are offering a safe and equitable service. Your existing system may be not be sufficient leading to an unethical service providing a first come, first served system that leaves patients without appointments that they need. You may want to improve the provision of healthcare to those with barriers for attending the practice. This might be the justification even if this is likely to lead to an increase in demand. 

If this is the reason that you are considering introducing an alternative to a face-to-face consultation then you may wish to think about the following: