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Contact rates by staff discipline, by practice
The chart below shows the 2007/08 contact rates (per 1,000 registered patients) for GPs and practice-employed nurses for all 47 PTI practices in the sample. This chart shows that there is a large variation in contact rates between practices, and also in the ratio of GP versus nurse contact rates.
The total annual contact rate (including all contacts with either a GP or a practice-employed nurse) varies from around 2,200 to close to 5,800 contacts per 1,000 registered patients. How this workload is divided between GPs and nurses varies greatly between practices. In most practices the GPs do the bulk of the consultations ? typically two thirds or more in this sample of PTI practices (and up to 85% in one instance). However, in some practices the practice nurses account for more patient contacts than the GPs (up to 57% in one instance). The estimated combined contact rate based on all 47 practices and standardised for the Scottish population is just over 4,200, with GPs accounting for approximately 70% of the contacts.
The large variation between practices may reflect the makeup of the practice population (older and more deprived populations may consult more) or the organisation and staffing arrangements of the practice. Some practices may have more nursing staff than others and the nurses may be deployed in different ways, e.g. some practices will use treatment room nurses paid by the NHS Board (whose patient contacts are typically not captured as part of PTI) instead of employing their own practice nurses.
Contact rates per 1,000 registered patients by staff discipline (GP and practice nurse1 ),
for all PTI practices individually and for Scotland overall 2
financial year 2007/08 3
1 For PTI purposes, ?practice nurse? is defined as practice-employed nurses and their clinical assistants (e.g. phlebotomists and health care assistants), and ?GP? includes locums and registrars.
2 The estimates for Scotland are based on 47 PTI practices that submitted complete PTI data for the year ending 31 March 2008 and are standardised by age, gender and deprivation. Note that three of these practices submit data jointly and are therefore shown as a single practice.
3 Population source: Community Health Index (CHI) record, as at 30 September 2007.
Note: Due to improvements made to the statistical model used to calculate PTI estimates, figures shown here are not strictly comparable to these provided prior to 31 March 2009. See the Note of Revisions for further information.
Source: Practice Team Information (PTI), ISD Scotland (last updated 31 March 2009)
Related information:
Excel version of these charts for financial years 2003/04 to 2007/08 
(135KB)
Total contacts by discipline, Scotland
PTI queries 
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