10 Top Tips

Top TipsFor PCTs

  1. Set up regular formal or informal meetings with PCT staff and other interested parties.
  2. Copy your protocols and guidelines to the relevant Primary Care Teams.
  3. If you are drawing up new protocols, discuss them with interested parties including GPwSI (GP with Special Interest).
  4. Self Management Plans are an innovative way of getting patients involved with their treatment. PCT teams will have examples of these from other specialities you may be able to use as a template.
  5. Just ask!
  6. Ensure that systems are created for feedback to the PCT teams.
  7. The PCT offices are in an office somewhere in the middle of town. Why not visit them?
  8. If you think of the PCT as being staffed by ‘managers’, consider how you may be approaching them with a negative mindset. The PCT employs pharmacists, doctors, nurses, other allied health professionals as well as ‘managers’. In our experience, they are all people doing their best under difficult circumstances, some better than others (just like where you work at the moment). Alter your mindset!
  9. There is a community outside the PCT including the local council, mental health trust (if separate), nursing homes and other places and people relevant to your area of expertise. Get to know them.
  10. Every time you hold a meeting, invite somebody along from the PCT .