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An update on what you are telling us about your experience as a Priory patient

We receive over 50 patient survey results every month and the majority of the feedback is positive. You've told us how much you appreciate the caring approach provided by our teams and the support for prescribing and follow-up care for patients needing on-going care.

If you want to leave your feedback then the link to our patient feedback form is below:

Friends and Family Test

We continue to be busier than ever – to give you some idea of how we are supporting you all each week:

• every week our GPs, nurses and HCAs see 6,020 patients through face to face or telephone appointments
• our wider teams make over 24,000 contacts each week supporting reminders for your on-going care and medications
• we produce 7,020 prescriptions
• we send on 615 referrals and process 3,500 letters and results every week

Some of you are frustrated with the ability of our practice to always provide you with access to urgent care on the same day and appointments for more routine care as quickly as you would like.

We are frustrated too; we have increased the size of our teams and worked on our access system and have reduced our waiting times. Despite this there are still many days when we still cannot meet demand for our services. This demand outstripping the capacity in primary care is something which is happening nationally and complaints about access remain the single biggest area of concern for our patients.

We remain committed to prioritising our patients with the most worrying symptoms to keep them safe, and working with our patients to help them understand what they can do to get support if they are unwell but do not need urgent care on the same day.

We also remain committed to keeping our teams safe and well while they manage daily calls and visits. We felt it was important to share the impact on our teams when behaviours become abusive and aggressive and Dr Abbie Brooks shared her thoughts in late 2023 about what we were experiencing :Dr Abbie Brooks: A letter to our patients.

The positive feedback we had from some of our patients in response to sharing this was hugely appreciated by our teams – thank you.

What is the wider NHS system doing locally to support concerns about access?

Priory teams meet with colleagues at the hospital, other primary care practices, mental health services and Healthwatch most weeks. We share insights and deliver improvement projects which can reduce waiting times and develop our care delivery jointly for our patients.

Healthwatch are about to launch a York-wide engagement programme with local people to help ensure everyone can share their ideas and shape the 'what next' for NHS services locally in these unprecedented times.

Patient Participation Group – Friends of Priory

You can see the PPG webpage on our Priory website on:

Priory Medical - Friends of Priory

We would like to refresh how our Patient Participation Group works so it can support Priory patients and teams day to day, as well as work with Healthwatch during 2024.

We want to understand more about you and help you understand more about us.

We are keen to hear from you how you think you can best get involved and any ideas for us in building up participation from across our patients.

Some initial ideas are to:

• have outreach to patients who are at home, in care or residential homes
• have group meetings planned in different community settings and attend different advocacy and community groups in the city
• set up smaller focus groups with specific areas of interest
• online groups at a range of different times
• short surveys on topics out via mobile phones and letters
• walk-arounds and visits to our teams and sites with you
• newsletters from patients to other patients

Please click this link or use the QR code below for feeding back your thoughts or complete one of the forms at reception if you are in any of our practices in person:

What is a Patient Participation Group?

Patient Participation Groups (PPGs) are groups of patients, carers and GP practice staff who meet to discuss practice issues and patient experiences to improve services.

They enable regular communication between patients and the practice teams. They act as ‘critical friends’ passing on feedback they receive and provide information to patients on services that are available to them.