General Practice Assistants
Introduction
GP Assistants support doctors in the smooth running of their surgery by handling the routine administration and some basic clinical duties enabling the GP to focus on the patient. Depending on the practices needs the GP assistant can be trained to help with a variety of different tasks such as, dipping urine, taking blood pressure, ECGs & phlebotomy, arranging appointments, referrals and follow up appointments of patients along with many other tasks.
GP assistants have demonstrated an improvement in the individuals experience of care, how the care is provided, helped improve population health and the overall cost of care. Please visit the link below for more information on GP assistants.
General Practice Assistants | Health Education England (hee.nhs.uk)
Training and Accreditation
We are currently unable to offer places on an accredited GPA programme. Practices can be supported to utilise the framework and guidance on this programme to complete non-accredited in-house training. Those participating in this route should still create a reflective portfolio with support and guidance from a GP mentor, which should be signed off and competencies signed off by a GP mentor within the Practice. Training in-house should take between 6-9 months to complete fully.
There may be the opportunity for those undertaking non-accredited training to later submit their portfolio for external verification to obtain accreditation and those 10 credits at level 4, however, this is not able to be guaranteed at this point whilst HEE continues their procurement process.
Useful documents
3. GPA Portfolio Building – A Guide
6. GPA Phlebotomy Training Guidance
1. GPA Framework and Competencies