Practices in Wales will benefit from a 40% reduction in the number of QOF indicators in the coming year, it has been announced.
QOF reporting has been suspended over the last few months in a bid to reduce pressure on practices in the country.
The British Medical Association said it had agreed a reduction in QOF indicators rather than a further year of suspension.
It says the one-year deal is a “hybrid approach” while the GP contract is reviewed in Wales.
Under the deal, 165 QOF points will be suspended – 40% of the total.
Welsh health secretary Vaughan Gething said: “These changes will free up GPs to spend more time with the frail elderly.”
Dr Charlotte Jones, chair of the British Medical Association’s Welsh GP committee, said: “We did initially look at suspending QOF for the entire year, but this was potentially going to cause significant financial problems for payments and as this is a one-year agreement only, while we review the entire contract, we felt it better to adopt a hybrid approach.
“This gives us an opportunity to demonstrate to Welsh Government and health boards that practices and clusters can be trusted to implement quality care while also providing practices with useful pop-up reminders for on-going management of chronic disease areas.
“The outcome and learning from this hybrid work will inform future QOF reviews.”
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