The new GOS contract has maintained the obligation in the now defunct Terms of Service for practitioners to inform the GP of the results of an NHS sight test carried out on a patient with diabetes or glaucoma. The Department of Health consulted the Royal College of GPs, who insisted that the requirement should stay. It is our belief that GPs do not find this practice helpful and that it is in nobody’s interests for it to continue.
The AOP is asking all LOCs to write to their Local Medical Committee (LMC), asking them if local GPs wish to be informed of the results of each and every sight test carried out on a patient with diabetes or glaucoma.
If the LMC doesn’t feel that this information is useful and that GPs would prefer to be informed only of clinically significant findings, then the LOC should write to the Royal College of General Practitioners informing them of that fact and should also inform the AOP, so that we can put together a picture of LMCs’ views across the country and put further pressure on the RCGP to change its stance.
The Word document below contains the text of two letters - one to the LMC and one to the Royal College of GPs. The AOP urges LOCs to adapt these as they see fit and send them off as soon as possible.
