SOUTH ESSEX LOCAL MEDICAL COMMITTEE



SOUTH ESSEX LOCAL MEDICAL COMMITTEE

Minutes of the Meeting of South Essex Local Medical Committee

held via Microsoft Teams

at 1:15pm on Thursday 22nd April 2021

PRESENT: Dr P Chisnell (Chairman) Dr M Sharma (Vice Chairman)

Drs Aderonmu, Ahmed, Aung, Balmer, Deshpande, Dhanjal, Gunanathan, Jamshed, Kittle, Monk, Moss, Okoi, Porter, Raja, Ramoutar, Sarfraz, Srivastava and Ukpaka, Mr Fuller and Mrs Pedder.

PART ONE

The Chair began by welcoming everyone to the meeting and there being no matters to be taken in Part Two, he proceeded with the agenda.

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Apologies for absence had been received from Dr Marchant. Mrs Pedder joined late due to being at another meeting.

DECLARATION OF INTERESTS

There were no new declarations of interest.

MINUTES

The Minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 25th March 2021 were confirmed and approved for publication on the LMC website.

MATTERS ARISING

There were no matters arising that were not covered elsewhere on the agenda.

DISCUSSION TOPICS

1. LMC Budget

The proposed budget and LMC levy calculation for 2021/22 were received and considered by members. The budget had been agreed by the Board of Directors at their meeting on 9th February 2021 and now required ratification by both Committees. Members agreed unanimously to adopt the budget for 2021/22.

2. Home Testing Kit for CKD in People with Diabetes

MSE Diabetes Clinical Network are looking to implement a new home testing kit for CKD for people with diabetes. Details from the MSE website were received for comment.

Members had no specific comments other than to seek assurances that the benefits to patients outweighed the cost to the NHS of implementing the scheme. Any further comments should be e-mailed to the LMC office and will be fed back to Jenni Speller at MSE.

3. Doctorlink (Additional Tabled Item)

E-mail correspondence between Dr Sharma, Anthony McKeever, Executive Lead for MSE, and Peter King, Associate Director IT/Digital, MSE, was tabled. Dr Sharma had expressed her frustration at the lack of proper consultation with General Practice prior to the procurement of Doctorlink by MSE and also concerns as to potential patient safety issues. The response from Peter King did acknowledge that issues had been raised regarding this online platform but that monthly review meetings were held and that there were currently no outstanding issues. Furthermore, MSE

will be conducting a full clinical systems review in the early part of this financial year which will then inform a wholescale re-procurement exercise. Mr King confirmed that it was not possible to fund individual practice requests to use alternative software.

There was a general consensus amongst members that the two main issues with Doctorlink were the poor signposting and verbose reporting, which made it difficult to locate any pertinent information. Members cited other providers such as accuRX and Econsult as being more effective and user-friendly. Several PCNs had supported their practices to purchase alternative software and some practices have disabled Doctorlink.

The office will seek the views of North Essex members on Doctorlink and Dr Balmer will feedback to Peter King that South Essex members had no positive feedback on the system. He will also ask if MSE has any data on the actual usage of Doctorlink amongst practices that are signed up. In the meantime practices should be encouraged to report any issues with Doctorlink to the commissioner.

Whilst recognising that MSE had commissioned Doctorlink in an effort to meet online consultation targets, members unanimously agreed that the views of practices and PCNs should inform any future commissioning decisions.

4. Chief Executive’s Report

4.1 LMC Nominations

Nominations are invited for the roles of Chair, Vice Chair and Co-opted members. Completed nomination forms, or an e-mail seeking nomination (copied to nominators), should be sent to annette@.uk by 14th May 2021. The Chair and Vice Chair will complete their three year term off office in May, any members interested in applying for these positions are invited to contact Dr Balmer or Dr Raja at the LMC office for further information. Existing Co-Opted members are required to seek re-appointment if they wish to remain on the Committee.

4.2 LMC Board Meeting

Draft notes of the meeting of the LMC Board held on 9th February 2021 were received for information.

4.3 Institute of General Practice Management

Members received for information the joint response to IGPM dated 6th April 2021.

Following last month’s meeting, Mrs Pedder had contacted the LMCs Buying Group and ascertained that the commission earnings for North and South Essex LMCs for 2020-21 were £3,035.63. No further information had been received from IGPM as to the level of contribution they would be seeking in respect of set-up costs and therefore this will be discussed with the Committee at a future meeting once this detail is available.

4.4 NHS Response to Covid-19: Transition to NHS Level 3 Incident

Members received for information the NHS England letter dated 25th March 2021 which details the shift of management from a nationally coordinated to regional level.

5. Covid Vaccination Programme – Next Phase

The NHS letter dated 13th April 2021 from Dr Emily Lawson and Dr Nikki Kanani was received for information.

6. Clinic Letters

An e-mail from Dr Eric Watts, Chair of MSE Service User Committee, dated 15th March 2021 was received for information. Dr Balmer will liaise directly with Dr Watts, who is a former pathology consultant and is seeking feedback on any issues with GPs not receiving clinic letters.

Members asked that clarification be sought on the following:-

o Does this also apply to A&E letters?

o It is likely that practices will not know the full extent of the problem. If the MSE Service User Committee has any data it would be helpful to see this.

Dr Balmer will feedback to Dr Watts accordingly. In the meantime if members hear of any relevant issues in their constituencies they are asked to forward details to the LMC office.

4.7 Child Death Referrals

A letter from the Essex Coroner’s Office dated 18th March 2021 regarding the withdrawal of local guidance in relation to child death referrals was received for information. This had been circulated to practices.

8. LMC Guidance Documents

Members received for information two guidance documents that had been produced by Karl Fuller and circulated to practices and PCN Clinical Directors:-

o Parental & Sickness Leave.

o Investment & Impact Fund 2021/22.

Any questions on these documents should be addressed to karl@.uk

4.9 GP Coaching via RCGP

An e-mail from RCGP dated 31st March 2021 was received which provided details of coaching that has been commissioned by Mid and South Essex Health Care Partnership.

Details of the local Essex GP Coaching and Mentoring scheme had also been shared with practices this week. The GP-S scheme is funded by the CCGs/STPs and supported and monitored by the LMCs but is entirely independent and confidential and will be managed by GP-S, which is hosted by Nottinghamshire LMC. Mentors are currently being recruited and training sessions have been arranged throughout May. Anyone interested in becoming a mentor should complete the Expression of Interest form and submit it to GP-S.

4.10 Cervical Screening

An e-mail from Hayley McCarthy dated 18th March 2021 detailing the new Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital cervical sample takers database was received by members. The new database requires sample takers to undertake additional training, but this is proving problematic for some training providers.

5. ANY OTHER BUSINESS

5.1 Covid Passports

Dr Ramoutar expressed concern that practices may soon be inundated with patients asking for some form of “Covid passport”. Practices should be advised that there is currently no formal policy on this and if patients insist on having proof from their GP of having had a Covid vaccine (additional to their vaccination card), this would not fall within GMS work and would therefore be a chargeable service.

5.2 Support for Children & Families

Dr Ahmed had contacted the LMC office earlier today regarding a referral he had made to the Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Service. He had, in turn, been advised to complete a lengthy Teams around Family (TAF) Assessment and then facilitate a multi-disciplinary meeting. Dr Balmer had confirmed that this did not constitute GMS work and that it was not the responsibility of the GP to co-ordinate the TAF meetings.

6. DATE OF NEXT MEETING

The Annual General Meeting will be held at 1:15pm on Thursday 27th May 2021 via MS Teams.

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