NHS 111 Pilot in GP Practices

From October 1st patients who contact their GP practice when it is closed are being asked to ring NHS 111.

Local people will benefit by being able to ring a free telephone number to get through to urgent healthcare services, including GP Out of Hours appointments.

This development is part of how we are integrating urgent care services in North East Lincolnshire to ensure patients get the right advice, support and treatment when and where it is needed.

North East Lincolnshire’s Single Point of Access (SPA) has been in place since 2010 offering a genuine single contact point for health (including community physio and occupational therapy), mental health, adult social care and safeguarding enquiries and advice, and will remain so. However, to enable our area to meet the requirements of the national Integrated Urgent Care (ITC) specification, a managed change process began on 1st October with the new advice for patients who ring their GP practice out of hours is to call 111.

North East Lincolnshire patients who ring NHS 111 out of hours may need:

  • Advice and telephone support
    • Dealt with on the call by NHS 111
  • A GP Out of Hours appointment or other face to face appointment
    • Patient’s call transferred to SPA and local clinical triage
  • Emergency treatment
    • Ambulance dispatched by NHS 111

Callers will benefit from using a free phone number but will still keep the advantages from the long term development of the North East Lincolnshire SPA. The local health and care system will benefit because this will allow clinicians to spend more time on clinical calls rather than simple calls (for example callers who need advice, simple repeat prescriptions or who will be asked to make an appointment in-hours with their own GP) rather than an assessment and a face to face appointment.