Bristol arthritis patients to help GPs provide better service
Family doctors are to be given help to improve the level of care they offer arthritis patients - by the patients themselves.
Up to 40 patients with shoulder, elbow or knee pain will be recruited from a number of surgeries in Bristol as part of the research project, to give their opinion on how GPs can do better.
The research project is being run by Dr Shane Clarke, Clinical Research Fellow at the University of Bristol's Department of Social Medicine, who is being funded by a £118, 024 grant from the medical research charity the Arthritis Research Campaign.
Although musculoskeletal conditions account for one fifth of all visits to the doctor, a recent survey revealed that fewer than half of all GP trainees had ever had specific rheumatology training at medical school. As a result, family doctors had little confidence in their abilities to diagnose and assess arthritic conditions.
"Many GPs lack confidence in managing common musculoskeletal symptoms such as pain in the shoulder, elbow, or knee, and training in rheumatology for GPs has to date often been inadequate," explained Dr Clarke.
"I want to find out from the patients themselves what they expect from their GP when they visit the surgery with joint pain, and to find out which aspects of GP care are in most need of improvement. Then we will be able to target our teaching to GPs."
The Bristol patients will take part in a number of focus groups, and the information gathered will be used to compile a questionnaire, which in turn will result in special training sessions being devised for GPs.
Dr Clarke then plans to produce a video training package to be made widely available for as a resource for GPs. "This should help them manage one of the most frequently encountered problems in primary care, and one for which they often feel unprepared," he added.
The Arthritis Research Campaign is the only medical research charity which exists to find the cause of and cure for arthritis through more than 350 research programmes. It also has an education remit to educate medical and health care professionals, and people with arthritis, about the condition.
