Journal article
"Loops and hurdles": secondary analysis of patient interview data to explore the experience of patient access to UK general practice
- Abstract:
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Background
Many countries are experiencing a shortage of general practitioners, increased demand for primary care, resulting in difficulties for patients seeking access and leading to increased dissatisfaction. The NHS Delivery Plan for Recovering Access to Primary Care in May 2023 signalled a UK policy commitment to improve GP access.
Methods
To explore patients' experience of access to UK general practice as reported in previously conducted interview studies of COVID and non-COVID related conditions a secondary analysis of interviews with 286 participants from five qualitative interview studies originally carried out between 2020 and 2023 was conducted. Qualitative thematic secondary analysis using a mix of deductive and inductive coding was used to examine interview data about patients' experiences of health conditions and health services.
Results
The interview data reveal 'loops' and 'hurdles' experienced by patients which delay and complicate the process of accessing general practice. Obstacles to access included needing to phone back several times, using online triage systems and negotiating with receptionists. Some patients were able to develop strategies or had resources including time and knowledge of the health system that helped them overcome access barriers, but the overall picture is of difficult and often negative access experiences.
Conclusion
Secondary analysis of archived health experience interview data can provide additional evidence about access to care. Policy and practice solutions to access challenges increasingly rely on the use of phone and online systems of triage and for appointment making but these can increase delays and are experienced as significant barriers to access, fuelling dissatisfaction with primary care.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 889.1KB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1186/s12875-026-03376-5
Authors
+ National Institute for Health and Care Research
More from this funder
- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/0187kwz08
- Grant:
- NIHR133620
- Publisher:
- BioMed Central
- Journal:
- BMC Primary Care More from this journal
- Volume:
- 27
- Issue:
- 1
- Article number:
- 257
- Place of publication:
- England
- Publication date:
- 2026-05-16
- Acceptance date:
- 2026-05-12
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2731-4553
- Pmid:
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42143220
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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2420428
- Local pid:
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pubs:2420428
- Source identifiers:
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W7161255924
- Deposit date:
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2026-05-26
- ARK identifier:
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Frost et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2026
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2026. Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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