GP Champions Project

The Association for Young People’s Health has launched two new publications containing findings and best practice from their three-year GP Champions for Youth Health project, funded by the Department of Health.

The GP Champions Toolkit for General Practice, which can be downloaded at www.ayph.org.uk/publications/623_GPToolkit_ONLINE.pdf, contains learning from the 10 pilot sites. It suggests action points that all GPs could carry out to improve access and services for young people. It has been endorsed by the Royal College of General Practitioners and can be used and circulated at no cost.

They have also produced a GP Champions briefing, entitled Commissioning Effective Primary Care Services for Young People, which can be downloaded at www.ayph.org.uk/publications/622_Commissioners_ONLINE.pdf, outlining how the voluntary sector could be commissioned to provide health services for young people.

The project was run in partnership with Youth Access and the RCGP Adolescent Health Group and piloted the concept of linking GPs with the voluntary sector and young people.

The GP Champions Project concluded that collaboration between GPs and the voluntary sector was highly successful, although the model of work was different in each of the 10 pilot sites.

They found that joined-up working was most effective where new services were commissioned and fully funded by external bodies, as in Liverpool where the CCG funded a new drop-in service, and in South London, where the LeSoCo college of further education provided resources for weekly pop-up GP services on its three sites.

The work uncovered worrying trends, including a significant proportion of young people who were not registered with a GP and a barrier to access caused by telephone triage systems to get appointments.

A summary of findings is available at www.ayph.org.uk/publications/624_GP%20Champs%20project%20summary.pdf and further information and resources are available at www.youngpeopleshealth.org.uk/5/our-work/71/gp-champions-project.