The Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board (BOB ICB) has announced plans to overhaul primary care services, including general practice, community pharmacy, optometry and dentistry.

The proposal seeks to address ongoing challenges faced by primary care, such as high demand, dwindling access to services, an increasingly aged population with complex health demands, and burgeoning pressures on workforce recruitment and retention.

This overhaul forms part of the ICB's Integrated Care Strategy and Five-Year Joint Forward Plan published in 2023.

These plans aimed to meld primary care with community services across the ICB and outline innovative care delivery methods for patients.

The draft Primary Care Strategy unveiled three priorities to execute these ambitions: enhancing access for patients to receive appropriate first-time support for their health and wellbeing; providing proactive, personalised community-based care for patients with intricate health needs; and preventing ill health through the sharing and utilisation of data about the health needs of local communities.

To address these priorities, the ICB proposes the establishment of several services.

These include 'non-complex same daycare', where primary care better manages patients requiring same-day support for their non-complex conditions, thereby improving patient experiences.

This process will involve efficient patient triaging, allowing GPs to dedicate their time to patients with more complex care needs.

Additionally, Integrated Neighbourhood Teams would involve GPs collaborating with multidisciplinary community teams comprising hospital consultants, district and community nurses, care navigators, physiotherapists, social care and the voluntary sector.

This approach targets patients with multiple health conditions, such as the frail elderly.

The ICB's agenda also includes a focus on cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention.

Primary care will collaborate with health and care partners to reduce patients' CVD risks by addressing smoking, obesity and high blood pressure.

As CVD is a leading cause of protracted ill health and death across the ICB, this strategy will rely heavily on data-sharing and understanding local health needs.

Dr Abid Irfan, director of primary care at Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire West ICB, said: "Our draft strategy outlines solutions to tackle the challenges we face in primary care, including increased demand and the need to improve access with limited resources to support us.

"Our vision is to transform primary care across Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, and Berkshire West by integrating these services and ensure they work more closely with our health and care partners across our communities to provide better patient care."

The BOB ICB has appealed to the public for their views on the draft Primary Care Strategy via an online survey, which will be available until February 29, 2024. 

The draft strategy also explains how the ICB plans to evolve other aspects of primary care to meet its vision.

These include promoting wider usage of the NHS app for patients to access their medical records, order repeat prescriptions and manage regular appointments.

The ICB also aims to provide pharmacists with more training to assess patients and make prescribing choices without GP involvement, support the national launch of the minor eye conditions service across the ICB, and investigate the benefits of mobile dental units.

Dr Irfan concluded by saying: "We thank people for sharing their views and experiences about primary care services since we launched our engagement last November.

"However, we urge the public to read our draft strategy and take part in a new survey so we know our ambitions to transform primary care have their understanding and support."