Jul 25 2012
By Caroline Price
The RCGP is calling for GPs to review personal health budget care plans, warning that patients' health needs may not be met if their allocated funds run out.
The College has written to Care Services Minister Paul Burstow MP, asking him to address a number of concerns over the Government's current plans, including a risk that budgets will be set inappropriately and that patients could end up choosing treatments that are not proven to be clinically effective.
Under pilot schemes carried out to date, individual plans have been put together by the patient along with trained care brokers and specialist nurses, or with the help of the voluntary sector. However, the RCGP says in a position statement, GPs are crucial to properly assessing patients' health needs, particularly in the context of multimorbidities, where their generalist expertise is required.
The College calls for nationally set rules to ensure that the budget allocated is sufficient to meet the full cost of services identified as necessary in any individual's care plan. In addition, it suggests that each CCG should have a clearly defined set of criteria for decisions on what treatments and services can be included within a personal health budget.
RCGP Vice-Chair Professor Nigel Mathers, who led the position paper development, said: "We believe very strongly in the importance of each patient having personalised care and an opportunity to be involved in making decisions in partnership with their GP."
He added: "We want the Government to work with us to ensure that it gets the policy framework for implementation right and that the lessons from the pilot sites are learnt. We also need to be convinced that any potential risks have been mitigated."
Personal health budgets are set to be rolled out in England from October 2012, when the final report on evaluation of 20 pilots is due to be published.
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