Possible Scam Alert

We alerted you to this scam back in October but believe it may still be in operation so ask you to be especially vigilant when receiving ‘orders’ for materials. Practices have been contacted by a company called HCRA and advised that they placed orders for various materials in the summer (handbooks, CD-Roms, posters etc) that were evidently tailored specifically to the practices. The ‘dispatcher’ is adamant that the practices are liable and, as a consequence, the order is being dispatched and an invoice to the tune of £299 (including VAT and shipping/handling costs) would be sent to the practices. Needless to say the practices knew nothing about the order. Trading standards in the relevant areas have been contacted and we have been advised that the company website is registered in Canada and in all probability this is another scam. Please notify the LMC if you are approached by this company and take care to ensure that all your staff are aware of this scam and that they should triple check prior to signing any documentation/agreeing to receipt of any order.

Cervical Cytology Training

Earlier this year there was a question raised nationally with regard to mandatory cervical cytology training and whether this was appropriate for general practice. The Department of Health has sent this letter to PCTs confirming that there are no contractual requirements for GPs to have cervical cytology update training.

BMA Guidance on CCG Authorisation Process

The authorisation process is by which Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are deemed ready and able to take statutory responsibility for the commissioning budget. This guidance flags up risks and opportunities in this process, including how GPs and LMCs can ensure that CCGs develop into democratically robust organisations.

The National Dementia and Antipsychotic Prescribing Audit

Practices will receive a letter from the NHS Information Centre very soon with further information about the audit, including details on opting out for those practices that do not wish to take part. We support what the dementia audit is trying to achieve. The audit will extract a very limited dataset. GP practices are should opt in to the extraction of identifiable data for secondary purposes in accordance with agreed GPES principles and, though, unfortunately the circumstances and timing of this dementia audit do not allow for this, given the limited data to be extracted, we see no reason why practices should not take part.

Changes to the RCGP curriculum

The RCGP recently announced changes to the GP curriculum, which are due to be implemented from August 2012 , are being made in response to feedback gathered from users, and are largely focussed on making the curriculum more user-friendly with a clearer and more consistent structure. There will also be some updates to the content.