Do GP Registrars Care about QOF? An Audit of General Practice Registrar Quality and Outcome Framework Achievement

Abstract

Purpose The Quality and Outcome Framework (QOF) was introduced in 2004 as part of the General Medical Services Contract. In this age of austerity it has never been more important in general practice to ensure that QOF targets are achieved not only to improve the standard of care patients receive but also to ensure that income generation is maximized. We are a six-partner training practice with approximately 13,000 patients and 4 full time GP Registrars. It was an incidental finding that on reviewing the patients’ notes that the registrars had seen, the relevant QOF indicators had not been addressed in the majority of cases during the routine consultations. Methods In the first week of February 2013 random routine surgeries were retrospectively selected for each registrar and each patient’s notes were reviewed with regards to how many QOF indicators had been addressed or missed by the registrar during the consultation. A second round of audit was conducted during the final week of February to investigate if the recommendations for change in practice had made any difference to clinical performance. Results The majority of registrars significantly improved following the tutorials discussing the recommendations for change in practice. Conclusions A formal QOF induction tutorial has been developed containing the recommendations for change arising from this audit. As a result it he hoped that the standards of clinical care, opportunistic health promotion, chronic disease management, practice income and registrar job satisfaction will all improve.