Qualitative assessment of triaging from primary care practitioners
and hospital specialists
Sars-CoV-2 has already changed the face of primary care in England; the
need to reduce face-to-face interactions means clinicians are embracing
new technology that allows remote assessment including SMS images and
video consultations.
Our previous qualitative work (Bradley PT et al; unpublished data) to
gauge the views of hospital specialists and primary care practitioners
has been supportive of a risk calculator. This work used a Normalization
Process Theory (that evaluates implementation and complex interventions)
to explore physicians’ attitudes to the introduction and use of a head
and neck clinical cancer decision tool (Version 1 of HaNC-RC) in both
primary care and hospital practice.
The views of eleven head and neck surgeons from the North East of
England were elicited via face-to-face interviews between
6th March 2019 and 9th July 2019.
The interviewees welcomed an evidence-based symptom tool and opined that
a robust tool offered additional confidence to decision-making. Concerns
about triaging in the hospital setting were expressed as adequate
information may not be available in the referral form; however, a
structured triaging system such as the one proposed in this work
directly addresses this concern. Primary care practitioners’ views
(twelve general practitioners in the North East were interviewed face to
face between 14th June 2019 and 5thDecember 2019) discussing the head and neck cancer risk calculator
(version 1) as a means to drive more confidence in the triage of
patients to suspected cancer clinics was met with enthusiasm. With
endorsement from secondary care and careful integration into the
pathway, it was felt that this approach could be an asset to both
primary and secondary care (Bradley PT et al; unpublished data).