The GP Collaborative Board (GPCB) is a new decision-making body that has been created to enable general practice in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire (BNSSG) to come together as a single entity, working with other providers as an equal partner in an Integrated Care System (ICS). The GPCB brings together all general practices within BNSSG supported by One Care (the GP federation) and Avon Local Medical Committee (LMC), as well as BrisDoc, the out-of-hours GP service provider. The structure and governance arrangements of the GPCB ensure that the voice of general practice remains a ‘golden thread’ through system-wide conversations.

The Board is made up of voting representatives from each of the Primary Care Networks (PCNs) in BNSSG and BrisDoc, as well as non-voting representatives from the localities, One Care and Avon LMC. The GPCB is led by the Chair and Vice-Chair.

Currently, the GPCB is working within the system on several programmes: digital strategy; mass vaccinations; outpatients, urgent care, and health and wellbeing. These programmes are steered by committees comprising clinical and non-clinical general practice representatives with a specialist interest in that area, and led by a clinical lead and programme manager.

These programmes are supported by One Care business intelligence, communications and digital expertise to enable change management within practices.

Here is an image showing the membership of the GPCB.

The GP Collaborative Board exists to:

• Coordinate general practice representation to ensure that the right people from general practice attend the right meetings with the right information
• Ratify new patient pathways and strategies
• Ensure accurate, relevant and timely information flows to, from and through general practice
• Enable general practice to come together at scale, giving a space for provider-to-provider conversations and supporting representation at Integrated Care Partnership (ICP) and Integrated Care System (ICS) level

For more information about why the GPCB is important for general practices in BNSSG, please watch the below video from some of our members.

If you have any questions, get in touch with us – GPCollaborativeBoard@onecare.org.uk. 

Working with practices

The GPCB gets its legitimacy from its practices. These practices cover every patient within BNSSG and deliver services worth over £150m each year. The GPCB also encompasses PCNs, localities and emerging ICPs, bringing all general practice’s distributed provider leaders together. The GPCB has representation on the One Care (BNSSG) CIC board providing connection and collaboration. One Care provides the executive delivery capability of the GPCB.

The GPCB will support those involved in developing Integrated Care Partnerships and will be an important link with the Integrated Care System and other system work.

The GPCB provides an overall framework that supports practices to come together at different scales to meet the needs of the changing system.

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Working with our partners

The GPCB has increasingly become the place to go for system-level decision making and engagement in general practice. It supports representatives at ICS level and new programmes of work which require general practice expertise in their development. The GPCB wholeheartedly supports the creation of six Localities around which Integrated Care Partnerships will form, whilst recognising that General Practice will need to be able to work at practice, PCN, Local Authority and System scales as well as at Locality level. The GPCB will be the vehicle whereby primary care becomes joint owner of the ICS with other health and care system partners.

The GPCB will act as an equal partner within the Healthier Together health and care system, collaborating with other partner organisations. The Board works according to its five key principles, which are:

• The GPCB is the go-to place for the system to engage with general practice
• General practice at-scale work should be funded by the system
• General practice should be involved in all system programmes from the outset
• Each programme requires programme management, as well as clinical and non-clinical input
• General practice engagement in system work will be prioritised in line with GPCB priorities

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History

In February 2020, practices asked One Care C.I.C, the BNSSG GP Federation, and Avon LMC to work with them to develop and implement an ethical decision-making process and good governance framework for general practice. This work was put on hold due to Covid-19, but restarted in late summer 2020.

At that time, it was recognised that there was an immediate need for an interim solution to be put in place to ensure that general practice was not a limiting factor in cross organisational and integrated working across BNSSG.

The decision was therefore made stand up a Shadow GP Collaborative Board from September 2020. The first meeting of the shadow board took place on 3 September 2020 and the shadow Board membership was made up of PCN Clinical Directors, locality leads and members of the One Care and Avon LMC boards. In April 2021, the GP Collaborative Board became substantive, and has been meeting on a monthly basis. The Board elected their Chair and Vice-Chair in June 2021.

For more information about the GPCB and why it was formed, watch the below video from One Care’s Chief Executive Ruth Taylor.