It’s that time of year once again, to look back over the past 12 months and decide which of your many (and we are sure there are many) highlights you want to enter for a General Practice Award.
Perhaps you work with an outstanding colleague who has gone the extra mile in delivering brilliant patient care. Maybe you launched a Greener Practice Initiative that would be perfect for our new Sustainability Award; or maybe you have introduced new technology into practice that is streamlining processes – this would be perfect for our second new award: The Digital Innovation Award. If so, make sure you download the entry forms today.
We also have all your favourite categories including GP of the Year, the Nursing Award, Clinical Improvement Awards, GP Trainee of the Year, PCN of the Year, and Practice Manager of the Year.
For our valued Suppliers, we have six categories now open for entry: Digital Provider, Medical Supplier, HCP Education Programme Provider, Telecoms Provider, Professional Services Provider, and Recruiter of the Year.
We have welcomed two new Sponsors to the GP Awards this year: Medi2data – sponsoring the PCN of the Year Award, and GP Profit Recovery (powered by Enhanced Technology) – sponsoring the Practice Manager of the Year Award.
If you are interested in sponsoring the General Practice Awards 2024, please contact [email protected] for further details and this year’s sponsor pack.
Deadline to enter: 16 May 2024
The General Practice Awards highlight the innovation, dedication, and passion of teams and individuals working across the UK. Last year, the 2023 General Practice Awards were held at the Novotel London West, and welcomed over 500 guests from across primary care and the community as well as the healthcare industry for a fantastic night celebrating the very best in patient care.
Pulse has launched an investigation into sexism in general practice.
Based mainly on a special survey of around 700 female and marginalised gender GPs, the four-part analysis reveals the extent to which women face abuse, harassment, casual sexist comments, hampered career progression and even burnout due to the nature of work given specifically to female GPs.
The first part of the sexism in general practice investigation will focus on the abuse, harassment and sexist comments they face from patients and colleagues in the practice. Female GPs have told us of being stalked by patients, facing harassment from senior partners and day-to-day belittling of their roles.
The second part will focus on how women’s career progression is affected, how sexist attitudes around partnerships and families continue to prevail, leaving women having to take sessional roles, even if they did want to pursue partnerships. It also shows how women are still being given certain types of clinical work that they may have no interest in, sometimes as a result of patient preferences, but sometimes due to outdated attitudes within the practice.
Pulse then explore the gender pay gap, which is greater in general practice than other professions, even when controlled for other factors. We look at how the GP funding crisis disproportionally affects female GPs.
And finally, an analysis of female representation on health boards, PCNs and professional groups.
The full investigation will be released this week, on the Pulse investigations hub.
The recent HHE Clinical Excellence in Cardiovascular Care event, held on 19 March, welcomed 175 medical professionals working in MDTs across the UK including Cardiologists, Cardiology Nurses, Cardiovascular Specialists, Emergency Medicine, and Heads of Departments including Nephrology, Paediatrics, and Radiology.
Over 70 hospitals were represented, and attendees joined us for the HHE Clinical Excellence in Cardiovascular Care event from as far apart as Scotland and Cornwall – the benefit of virtual events meaning we can reach our audience wherever they are based. The most popular topics at this event proved to be heart failure, cardiorenal syndrome, and interventional cardiology.
Developed by Hospital Healthcare Europe and Hospital Pharmacy Europe in 2023, and with the help of an advisory board of clinical specialists, the events are free to attend and delivered virtually live and then available on-demand. Tailored to work around busy schedules.
For our clients, the events offer a great opportunity to tap into a hard-to-reach market, showcasing your products and services to an engaged audience. By sponsoring a session on the agenda, you can place your brand directly in front of clinical professionals working in hospitals across the UK.
March has been a busy month for Cogora: The Agency, with a number of new projects kicking off as others wrap up.
Some of the Cogora: The Agency team headed to Dubai to support their clients on-site at the 21st International Congress of Endocrinology. The educational symposia were well attended, with nearly 200 attendees across the two sessions. The sessions were also well received, with 100% of attendees stating that they would recommend the educational activity to other HCPs. The client was thrilled with the smooth delivery of the project and the successful execution of the symposia. The Agency are looking forward to supporting more educational symposia for the same client at the European Congress of Endocrinology (ECE), taking place in Sweden in May.
The team have continued development and refinement of an interactive care pathway to support a drug launch in the gastroenterology field. As the pathway progresses, the team are now developing leave pieces and suggesting additional ways to support the launch.
A new project will be kicking off soon, supporting the development of a NICE medical technologies guidance company evidence submission for a client working in the medical technology field. With an ambitious plan to review up to 70 articles, the team will have to expertly identify and prioritise the relevant literature and create impactful summaries for use in the evidence submission.
A value dossier refresh also kicked off this month, with the Agency team supporting the review and updating of an existing client asset. Recognising the value of not “reinventing the wheel”, the team is supporting their client in identifying new or updated literature, where it fits within the dossier and highlighting any sections that may no longer be relevant, while still maintaining existing relevant materials.
Two new assets to support GPs and nurses in understanding menopause and the role they can play in ensuring patient access to appropriate treatment were started this month. With the funding having been provided at arm’s length, the Agency team are handling all aspects of development alongside their KOLs.
The writing team have prepared yet another manuscript for publication in an open-access, peer-reviewed journal, this time on optimising patient safety through the early identification of characteristics of avoidable complications arising from the use of peripheral intravenous catheters. Submission is scheduled for April ’24. For the same client, 2024 activities have kicked off in the last week of March, with two virtual working groups. Plans are afoot for a face-to-face advisory board in early July.
A new project supporting a lecture tour series kicked off this month, supporting educational awareness on treatments for severe eosinophilic asthma. With a planned delivery in June, the team will be optimising timelines, streamlining preparations and nimbly adapting to the client need to ensure this challenging ask can be met.
Check out what the team were up to in February for more examples of how Cogora: The Agency delivers consistent value for its clients. For more information, please contact us.
We are thrilled to announce the results of our recent Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 user feedback survey, demonstrating fantastic levels of engagement and interest in both platforms.
Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 are centralised learnings hubs for our community of GPs and primary care nurses to fulfil their learning requirements. Choosing from a mix of bite-sized, interactive, and longer-form content spanning over 20 clinical areas, users can choose content to consume depending on their preferences and time.
A recent survey to users revealed that 91% of respondents find Nursing in Practice 365 good/very good/highly valuable and 88% of respondents find Pulse 365 good/very good/highly valuable.
The survey found that both Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 users enjoy the quality and relevance of the content, wide range of topics, and convenient access to free CPD education, with over 70% using the platforms weekly to help keep their clinical knowledge up to date.
User testimonials have been extremely positive:
‘It’s online, easy access. Various topics are covered – you can choose depending on your interest and time. Very useful and I would highly recommend it.’ – Pulse 365 user
‘So informative, educational and relevant to my role, which then enhances my practice, skills and knowledge, for which my patients benefit from’ – Nursing in Practice 365 user
‘CPD available, live or on demand, to work around clinics busy schedules. Informative sessions with well-presented speakers and content’ – Pulse 365 user
Across both platforms, our CPD modules are written by primary care experts, and are accessible in article, case based and video formats. This variety of formats is seen as a benefit for our users, with the survey revealing that both Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 users prefer a mix of short-form (0.5-1 CPD hour) and long-form content (e.g. 1.5 – 2 CPD modules) when consuming CPD education modules.
Findings highlighted key clinical areas of focus for CPD in the next 12 months, with respiratory being the top priority for Nursing in Practice 365 users and women’s health for Pulse 365 users.
Other important areas of CPD focus include diabetes and endocrinology, cardiology, and sexual health and gynaecology, as well as dermatology for Pulse 365 users and women’s health for Nursing in Practice 365 users.
Additionally, over 50% of respondents would be interested in consuming non-clinical leadership and management learning modules, with over 40% interested in career development modules.
Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 offer clients a unique way to target a large pool of primary care clinicians. Please contact us for more information about our CPD platforms, and available sponsorship packages.
About the survey
An online survey was carried out among Pulse 365 and Nursing in Practice 365 users in February 2024, with 283 and 143 respondents respectively. This was done to gather insight into how our community use the sites, and what their learning preferences are.
Across our media brands, clients can host sponsored content. These pages can be a simple hosted PDFs, or more bespoke builds with multiple tabs, and can include a variety of content.
The primary objective of a sponsored hub is to disseminate educational content effectively across our media platforms, thereby enhancing its outreach to a broader audience. These hubs can be hosted on Pulse, Nursing in Practice, The Pharmacist, Management in Practice, Healthcare Leader, Hospital Healthcare Europe, or Hospital Pharmacy Europe.
Sponsored hubs can take the form of either straightforward hosted PDFs or more intricately designed structures with up to six tabs. They have the capacity to incorporate a diverse array of content elements, ranging from text, videos, podcasts, and images to hosted materials.
Copy can either be written by our Cogora: The Agency team or can be supplied by the client. Our design and development teams are then tasked with the challenge of presenting this content in a compelling and user-friendly manner, ensuring optimal compatibility across both desktop and mobile devices.
We first start by identifying the key features, functionalities, and design preferences, before creating wireframes to outline the basic layout and structure of the page. We define navigation menus and use pathways to ensure a seamless user experience, and focus on the placement of key elements, content sections, and calls-to-action. Your brand identity, colour schemes and overall aesthetics are applied before design mock-ups are presented to stakeholders. Once approved, our team will build the page, following core UX principles.
As part of our ongoing commitment to ensure high levels of engagement for hosted content, we include a range of organic traffic drivers within sponsored hub projects, to help HCPs access and engage with your content. This includes promotion via our editorial newsletters and across the website, accounting for up to 40% of traffic.
Clients are kept up to date with performance of the sponsored content metrics via monthly campaign engagement reports.
For the opportunity to host your content on one of our sites, reaching our community of healthcare professionals, please contact us today.
Pulse PCN’s latest roundtable, Digital transformation: PCN progress so far, brings clinical directors and digital transformation (DTL) leads together to discuss how networks are working with these roles.
In Pulse PCN’s latest roundtable, Digital transformation: PCN progress so far, three clinical directors join three DTLs from Cheshire, Southampton and London to discuss the success, potential and future of digital transformation in PCNs and practices.
Pulse PCN editor Victoria Vaughan says: ‘This roundtable shows the potential of having skilled coders and IT professionals in your PCN which can have a huge impact on how a practice is run.
‘It also covers how the role is being interpreted by PCNs and deployed in primary care and the potential working in this sphere has for practices and patients.’
Pulse PCN’s quarterly roundtables examine the core tasks PCNs must deliver as part of the PCN Network DES and the work of the additional roles reimbursement scheme (ARRS) staff they have hired into primary acre.
Pulse PCN’s roundtable series is part of our comprehensive offering for our community of primary care network (PCN) clinical directors and their teams. And they are now hosted the dedicated Pulse PCN site making it easier to access these great clinician-led debates.
For the opportunity to reach our audience of decision-makers across PCNs through a variety of digital advertising options, please contact us today.
Cogora: The Agency has had a busy February, pushing some projects closer to the finish line, and making a start on some new ones.
The team have kicked off the preparation of an interactive care pathway to support a drug launch on the gastroenterology field. Following on from the Advisory Board meetings in December and a great face-to-face meeting with the client, the Agency proposed a number of ways to support the client’s strategic goals and have now started work on the first of the assets.
Throughout February, the Agency has been pushing projects to completion. Three ongoing compendia that focus on integrated diagnostic solutions are approaching finalisation ahead of an important congress in March. The client has been delighted with the speed at which the compendia have been turned around, and the flexibility the Agency have shown in meeting their deadlines.
A new project supporting integrated solutions management has kicked off, with a series of LinkedIn posts and Google ads. The team researched keywords relevant to the two target audiences and crafted two bespoke campaigns. From the excellent work on these assets, the Agency were asked to support the development of a brochure to support the marketing goals of the client.
The team have spent much of February familiarising themselves with the role of certain medications in the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus, with a handbook and quick guide both in development. Both assets have required different strategies, with one asset meeting a client brief and the other involving a hands-off sponsorship.
The writing team have prepared yet another manuscript for publication in an open-access, peer-reviewed journal, this time on optimising patient safety through the early identification of characteristics of avoidable complications arising from the use of peripheral intravenous catheters. Submission is scheduled for April ’24.
The Agency are preparing to jet off to Dubai to support their clients on-site at the 21st International Congress of Endocrinology. The educational symposia that are being supported are the result of many weeks of collaboration and careful crafting of the client’s message. The team look forward to continuing this relationship beyond Dubai as they will be supporting educational symposia for the same client at the European Congress of Endocrinology (ECE), taking place in Sweden in May. The planning for this next project has already begun.
Check out what the team were up to in January for more examples of how Cogora: The Agency delivers consistent value for its clients. For more information, please contact us.
Since concluding the 2023 HCM Academy programme, the on-demand case studies have been generating fantastic engagement and feedback.
Brought to you by PCM Scientific, our CME division, HCM Academy programme offers independent medical education, surrounding diagnosis and best practice care for patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM).
After running a primary and secondary care webinar series, with the support of our international faculty and steering committee members, a series of on-demand case studies are now avaialble, offering impactful education on diagnosis and best practice care and management of HCM.
Although common, HCM is often under-diagnosed and under-managed, significantly worsening the outcomes for patients and profoundly impacting their lives and their families. Obtaining a diagnosis and can be challenging and careful management, including shared decision-making, are needed for patients with HCM.
The level of engagement, learner feedback and education impact from these case studies has been outstanding.
All users reported that they would recommend this educational event to other healthcare providers. This feedback demonstrates that the education not only enhances knowledge but also impactful in management and practice with expressions of appreciation such as “Great educational activity!”, and “Excellent activity!”.
The on-demand case studies are designed to raise disease awareness and knowledge of HCM, as well as provide practical guidance for achieving a differential diagnosis for HCM via real patient cases.
The complimentary case studies were presented and discussed by our international leading experts from US and Europe in line with the corresponding online CME webinars. All six secondary care case studies are now available to watch on-demand for free.
The IOTOD Winter webinar (Improving Outcomes in the Treatment of Opioid Dependence) took place in February 2024, and explored the topic of mental health conditions and opioid dependence.
Delivered by our CME division, PCM Scientific, the IOTOD webinar series aims to provide high quality, accessible education for primary and secondary care healthcare professionals across the globe, to improve patient outcomes in the treatment of opioid dependence.
PCM Scientific worked closely with expert faculty to develop the educational agenda for the 60-minute free live event: ‘Integrative treatment for comorbid conditions: the importance of treating mental ill health when managing opioid dependence.’
Professor Maurice Dematteis, University Hospital of Grenoble, France joined Mr Duncan Hill, NHS Lanarkshire, Scotland, to discuss the overlap between patients with mental health conditions and opioid dependence.
During the live event, the experts discussed how failure to treat either aspect often results in suboptimal patient outcomes and exacerbation of both conditions. The agenda also explored how trauma, pain and poor sleep hygiene can influence both comorbid conditions, highlighting for learners the importance of working within a collaborative care model, thereby improving outcomes for patients. The event concluded with a Q&A session.
The webinar was promoted via our primary and secondary care media brands, as well as the existing IOTOD community, across the UK and Europe. The target audience included addiction specialists, pain specialists, GPs, primary care nurses, community pharmacists, psychiatrists, and social workers, as well healthcare professionals with an interest in the field.
The educational programme is run at arm’s length from the financial supporters and all content is created by the faculty. No funder has had input into the content of the materials or presentations used in the educational programme. PCM Scientific is the medical education company acting as scientific secretariat and webinar organiser.
The NASGP are the independent membership body for general practice locums in the UK, founded by locums for locums. They have spent over 20 years supporting locums as they progress in their career, empowering them through a collective voice and effective support at every stage of their journey.
At Pulse LIVE London on 26 March, the closing plenary will welcome NASGP Founder and Chairman, Dr Richard Fieldhouse, along with Dr Victoria Tzortziou-Brown and Dr Venothan Suri to discuss the GP workforce: Have we swapped a recruitment crisis for a retention crisis?
Dr Fieldhouse has said about his visit to Pulse London: ‘I’m really glad to be at this event, both as a delegate and a speaker, especially as workforce is so topical at the moment. The number of GP locums in the UK has increased by 5,000 GPs in the last five years, but the funds to utilise us in a sustainable way has not materialised. And with the GP contract negotiations not going as well as they could be at the moment, with the potential for looming industrial action, what could possibly go wrong?!’1
Pulse LIVE London is the must-attend free GP event of the year, specifically created for all practising, GMC-registered GPs and trainees in the UK. Not only does it provide the chance to listen and learn from experts in their fields, but it provides the ideal networking opportunity to meet with likeminded GPs while gaining up to 8 CPD hours. This is a great opportunity for GPs to kick-start 2024 and continue their professional development.
‘Excellent conference with the chance to choose the talks that you wish to attend which makes it more relevant. Also very high quality speakers and choice of topics. Overall excellent.’ ~ Jonathan Moore, Portfolio GP, Pulse LIVE London 2023 attendee.
If you wish to sponsor, exhibit or partner with an upcoming Pulse LIVE Event, please get in contact with our Event Sales Manager Nick Hayward.
1: www.nasgp.org.uk. (n.d.). NASGP chair to join panel on workforce at London event | NASGP. [online] Available at: https://www.nasgp.org.uk/medical-orgs/rcgp/nasgp-chair-to-join-panel-on-workforce-at-london-event/ [Accessed 22 Feb. 2024].
Community pharmacies can sign up to offer advice and treatment, where merited, around seven common clinical conditions, guided by new national clinical protocols. These are conditions where the patient would have otherwise needed an appointment at a GP practice.
The Pharmacist’s new Pharmacy First zone will bring together ongoing news and clinical content, supporting pharmacy teams to deliver the new services, plus highlighting the useful content we have already produced as the service was being developed.
New articles will be promoted on The Pharmacist’s newsletters and social media, and will be available through our app.
Thousands of consultations have already been delivered by pharmacists in the first few weeks of the service, and a public awareness campaign has been launched by the NHS.
Many other pharmacy-led clinical services are discussed in The Pharmacist’s Clinical zones, from respiratory, to immunisation, menopause, contraception and hypertension, alongside over 200 clinical case studies that highlight the work of pharmacists who have pioneered privately-led services in their local communities and developed the clinical expertise of their teams.
For advertising opportunities across the Pharmacy First zone, please contact us today.
The Pharmacist delivers the latest daily political, business, and clinical news in the pharmacy sector; with blogs and clinical and professional features on key topics affecting community, PCN, and in practice pharmacists. Our clinical updates span a wide variety of therapy areas relevant to primary care, such as: cancer, dermatology, diabetes, gastroenterology, immunology & vaccination, mental health, respiratory, sexual health, smoking cessation and travel health.
We are thrilled to unveil the Pulse Reference relaunch, a unique resource that allows GPs to make sense of their patients’ symptoms and delve deeper into likely diagnoses.
Unlike any other tool or website on the market, Pulse reference is comprehensive, easy to access, practical and written from the real world of general practice. It will point the GP towards possible differentials, highlight useful tips and red flags along the way and help towards formulating a likely diagnosis.
The journey is then completed with a useful overview summarising all the key information the GP needs to know for that diagnosis, from epidemiology through assessment to treatment and prognosis.
How GPs can use Pulse Reference:
Step 1: Start your search: Type a symptom, keyword or illness into the search bar
Step 2: Select the link most relevant to your search
Step 3: Explore the full GP analysis of the symptom, which includes:
Differential Diagnosis: the likely diagnoses, subdivided Common, Occasional and Rare
Ready Reckoner: key distinguishing features of the most common diagnoses
Possible Investigations: those tests most likely to assist you in making the diagnosis
Top Tips: useful hints from the authors’ experience
Red Flags: scenarios that should ring alarm bells – and why
Information is presented in a consistent, comprehensive, and digestible way. It is also a vital learning tool for those starting out in general practice.
The experts behind Pulse Reference are Dr Keith Hopcroft and Dr Poppy Freeman. Dr Keith Hopcroft is the co-author of Symptom Sorter and has been Pulse’s editorial advisor for more than 15 years. He is a GP in Basildon, Essex, a medical student trainer and medical writer and columnist. Dr Poppy Freeman is also a clinical advisor to Pulse and set up the Covid Toolkit on Pulse Today in 2020 to provide GPs with up-to-date guidance on all the clinical and organisational Covid updates. She is a GP in Camden.
Please contact us today to discuss details of our exclusive, high-profile sponsorship opportunity, providing access to HCPs actively engaging with Pulse Reference.
The Pulse PCN Cardiovascular Disease roundtable brings clinical directors and cardiovascular leads together to discuss how networks are delivering on this service specification.
Pulse PCN’s cardiovascular disease roundtable sees six leading GPs from Cheshire, Leicestershire and London discuss the success and challenges in improving hypertension case finding and work in diagnosing familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH).
Pulse PCN editor Victoria Vaughan says: ‘This roundtable shows how GPs are changing the way services are delivered to actively find hypertensive patients and treat them before the situation potentially escalates to a heart attack or stroke.
‘The examples from delegates at the discussion show how PCNs and GP practices are, in some areas, moving away from a sickness service to a prevention service – a popular idea among policy makers as a sustainable way to maintain the NHS.
‘We’ve also released this roundtable now in support of the British Heart Foundation’ s heart health month which encourages everyone to learn CPR in 15 minutes for free. ‘
Pulse PCN’s quarterly roundtables examine the core tasks PCNs must deliver as part of the PCN Network DES and the challenges and opportunities this work brings.
Explore 12 thought provoking roundtables covering topics such as structured medication reviews, covid vaccination and early cancer diagnosis highlighting the thoughts of clinical directors from across England.
Pulse PCN’s roundtable series is part of our comprehensive offering for our community of primary care network (PCN) clinical directors and their teams. And they are now hosted on a new Pulse PCN roundtable hub making it easier to access these great clinician-led debates.
For the opportunity to reach our audience of decision-makers across 1,250 PCNs through a variety of digital advertising options and future roundtables, please contact us today.
Our educational platforms, Pulse 365and Nursing in Practice 365, give GPs and primary care nurses a centralised hub to fulfil their learning requirements. Improve patient learnings by sponsoring a CPD module.
Choosing from a mix of bite-sized, interactive, and longer-form content spanning over 20 clinical areas, users can choose content to consume depending on their preferences and time. Written by primary care experts, our CPD modules are accessible in article, case based and video formats, and are free to access for all users.
How does it work?
Cogora will work with you to discuss a preferred format, module objective and topic. We will then propose a CPD module title, brief and suggest a couple of KOLs/writers.
Once agreed, we will work with the KOL to write the module. And once approved, the module will go live, and will be promoted to our audience of GPs/nurses, with a guaranteed number of module completions over 12 months, with monthly reporting.
CPD sponsorship allows you to develop eLearning and reach our engaged community of primary care professionals. Your eLearning content will be promoted via the website, newsletters and social media.
We have received great feedback from users over the years regarding the quality of sponsored modules and how they have proved useful for their professional development. Here are a few examples of what we have received:
“Outstanding update, clear and super informative, and practical.”
“Interesting, thorough and practice-changing.”
“Excellent module with useful information to implement in clinical practice.”
“Good module. Learned a lot about a topic I previously knew little about.”
“Extremely helpful overview.”
Please contact us for more information about our CPD sponsorship packages.
For all 2024 events, Cogora is offering all sponsors enhanced data on the events that they engage with as well as better insights into those they are considering attending.
Using Cogora’s first and third party data, we will now be sharing enhanced detail of the profile of attendees at each event. Post show summaries will detail not only the number of attendees and job title breakdown but also the number of practices, PCNs and ICNs represented. They will give an indication of the patient list size represented by attendees at the event and total NHS budget. Sponsors will also be able to see which clinical areas have been identified as areas of interest or which topics have been requested at future events.
For those sponsors with workshops at a face-to-face or virtual event, these figures can also be provided a session level, allowing you to see the reach and potential influence of your educational content alongside attendee feedback from the session.
Exhibitor dashboards
Providing a secure platform to access data from Cogora events, our brand new exhibitor dashboards combine first party attendee data with Rx data to give pharmaceutical sponsors even greater insight into the spending and prescribing habits of attendees at events they attend.
The new bespoke dashboards allow each sponsor to dictate which drug(s) to analyse and compare it to other prescription products within the same clinical area. With insights both at a global (all attendee) level, session or stand level (i.e those that have actively engaged with a specific sponsor) or individual level, sponsors now have the opportunity assess and analyse the potential impact of their event involvements.
Interested in finding out more about our event post show reports? Contact us today for more information.
Pulse’s final issue has gone out with a bang, focusing on the past, present and future of Pulse and general practice. In this extra special edition, we’ve gone back to broadsheet size, which is how Pulse was published for the majority of its time in print. We have also mimicked the style from our very first issue in 1960.
The Pulse: Past, present and future issue is also dotted with front covers from yore, many of which still have relevance. We have articles on the major clinical developments of the last 65 years, chosen by the RCGP and written by luminaries of general practice. We look at the origins of Pulse and the incredible life of its first editor.
In our focus on current general practice, we have an exclusive interview with the GPC England chair on the current state of the profession, and have a special column from Chris Morris, one of Britain’s greatest ever satirists and the son of two GPs.
For the future section, we look at some outlandish and not so outlandish predictions, consider what part AI will be likely to play in general practice and take the views of the next generation of GPs.
Every day over the month of February, we will publish a new article on PulseToday as part of the ‘Pulse in Print’ series, including all the copy from the issue plus much much more.
The team has already been inundated with requests for copies of the print issue and it is likely to prove to be a collector’s item.
Please contact us today to discuss sponsorship opportunities of our ‘Pulse in Print, the future of general practice’ articles.
Our latest case studies look at how the Besins Hormone Academy was created to support and upskill UK primary care professionals in testosterone deficiency care, and menopausal and perimenopausal care.
Working with Besins Healthcare (UK), a global market leader in the provision of men’s and women’s health and wellbeing products, Cogora first organised and hosted the Besins Menopause Roadshow 2023. This consisted of five peer-to-peer education meetings delivered in person across the UK, Birmingham, London, Manchester, Glasgow, and Newcastle.
The events sought to simplify healthcare professionals’ (HCPs’) understanding of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) prescribing, debunking common myths, and talking through the risks and benefits of management options in different scenarios.
We then developed the Testosterone Deficiency platform, hosting a series of educational resources, including recorded webinars and audio soundbites. The resources prioritised the goal to improve clinical confidence to identify testosterone deficiency and help men navigate this condition.
Across the Besins Hormone Academy, Cogora assumed responsibility for all aspects of concept/branding, the agenda, speaker/faculty management and liaison, content development, event logistics, website development, design of onsite materials and marketing assets, and recruitment.
Throughout January, Cogora: The Agency has been busy making plans for the year and kicking off 2024 with a bang.
The Agency have been hard at work on the preparations for the 21st International Congress of Endocrinology, taking place in Dubai in March 2024. The team have collaborated on a plethora of conference materials, liaising with therapy area experts and clients to ensure a consolidated message that speaks to the educational needs of healthcare practitioners (HCPs). The team are delighted to continue supporting the same client with their educational symposia planned for the European Congress of Endocrinology (ECE), taking place in Sweden in May 2024. The creative concepts will flow from one congress to the next, ensuring a consistent and clear educational message.
The team braved adverse weather conditions to join three clinical experts, a nurse, a hepatologist and radiologist, to record a short educational video on the use of peritoneal catheters in patients with malignant and non-malignant ascites. The filming session was so successful that the team are now preparing a further continuous professional development (CPD) module from the additional material discussed by the speakers on the day. The recording session also gave the team a great opportunity to sit down with the client face-to-face and discuss their goals for the next year and how the team might be able to support their growth and development strategy.
Following on from the Advisory Board meeting in December, the Agency have developed a proposed care pathway and strategic recommendations ahead of a key drug launch in the gastroenterology space. A meeting summary and the proposed next steps for developing the administrative and educational materials needed to ensure a smooth launch once approval has been received have been developed and refined with input from the expert faculty. The streamlined assets proposed aim to facilitate optimal uptake of a new therapy, giving patients greater choice in their available treatments. The team are excited to discuss the options with the client this month in a face-to-face meeting.
The results of a second Advisory Board that took place in December covering the use of a short-acting formulation of a medication used to treat abnormal growth hormone levels featured faculty from across Europe. A follow-up interview with a faculty member who could not attend the meeting on the day provided some additional insights, with an interesting discussion of older research that may be overlooked and could be revisited. The interview prompted an additional strategic suggestion for the client, which we hope to follow up with them as the year progresses.
Finally, the team are preparing a number of assets relating to the safe handling of hazardous drugs, specifically the use of carcinogens, mutagens or reprotoxic substances at work. The deadline to implement updates to an EU directive into national law across the EU is April 2024. The amendment to the directive includes more stringent protections for workers, of which employees and employers alike should be aware. Two infographics together with an educational CPD module and key paper evaluation have been developed to bring all stakeholders up to speed on this important development in occupational safety.
Check out what the team were up to in December for more examples of how Cogora: The Agency delivers consistent value for its clients. For more information, please contact us.
Nursing in Practice is asking for feedback from readers over January and February, publishing the 10 points of the Nursing in Practice Manifesto for General Practice Nursing in 2024, and inviting comments on each of the action points on social media.
Two of the 10 points of the Nursing in Practice manifesto will be launched each week at nursinginpractice.com, via our newsletters, app, and social media. The nurses who contributed to the manifesto speak about their concerns and recommendations.
In the manifesto, GPNs highlighted issues such as workforce shortages, soaring patient demand, and pay and conditions that fall far short of those on offer to nurses working elsewhere in the NHS as just some of the ongoing issues hampering their nursing practice. Nurses identified health inequalities, targeting immunisation uptake, greater focus on supporting patients with long-term conditions, and promoting health, as important areas requiring particular attention.
With changing roles and ways of working across general practice and primary care, many nurses in have told us that the next 12 months are crucial for identifying and addressing issues within the sector, as the pace of change is rapid.
The Nursing in Practice team will return to these important topics identified by the manifesto over the year – to help highlight problems and potential solutions, and to support continued debate.
Nurses are encouraged to keep an eye out for our upcoming projects around these themes, and to get in touch if they would like to get involved in the conversation and share their own experiences.
Nursing in Practiceis now a fully digital publication, with articles updated daily by our expert journalist and clinical team, providing nurses with news, features, opinions, clinical advice and CPD, online, in newsletters and via the app.
The IOTOD Winter webinar (Improving Outcomes in the Treatment of Opioid Dependence) will be taking place 7th February 2024.
The 60-minute webinar, titled ‘Integrative treatment for comorbid conditions: the importance of treating mental ill health when managing opioid dependence’, will be led by Professor Maurice Dematteis, Head of the Department of Addictions, University Hospital of Grenoble, France, and Mr Duncan Hill, specialist Pharmacist in Substance Misuse, NHS Lanarkshire (NHSL) Glasgow, Scotland.
The webinar, developed by our CME division, PCM Scientific, will explore the overlap between patients with mental health conditions and opioid dependence (OD), and how failure to treat either aspect often results in suboptimal patient outcomes and exacerbation of both conditions. Understanding the role of mental ill health in OD and how factors such as trauma, pain and poor sleep hygiene can influence both comorbid conditions.
The discussion will highlight the importance of working within a collaborative care model to improve outcomes for patients.
The IOTOD Winter webinar is being promoted to our community of primary and secondary care healthcare professionals via our media brands, as well as the well-established IOTOD community. Attendees included addiction specialists, GPs, primary care nurses, community pharmacists, psychiatrists, as well as other healthcare professionals interested in the management of opioid use disorder across the UK and Europe.
The level of interest in this webinar is evident, with registrations already surpassing expectations, totalling over 350 registrants.
The educational programme is run at arm’s length from the financial supporters and all content is created by the faculty. No funder has had input into the content of the materials or presentations used in the educational programme. PCM Scientific is the medical education company acting as scientific secretariat and webinar organiser.
The Management in Practice Salary Survey reveals that the average annual salary of a full-time GP practice manager is £48,802.
The pay report, Practice Manager Salary Survey 2023/24: gauging the state of the profession, produced in association with MCG Healthcare, also found that pay scales for practice managers are very broad, ranging from under £20,000 to more than £100,000 (for both part-time and full-time workers).
The survey of 975 practice managers in the UK found that the largest group – 34% – reported earning between £41,000 and £50,000 a year. Only 1% earn between £81,000 and £100,000.
The majority (77%) of practice managers received a pay rise in the past year, with most being awarded between 2% and 5%.
And two fifths of practice managers receive a monetary bonus, with 61% of that group awarded bonuses worth between 6% and 15% of their base salary.
The comprehensive pay report offers insight into how practice manager pay is determined with the most common factor being affordability regardless of market rates or other factors (42%).
More than a quarter said that at their surgery, practice manager pay is based on their level of specialist skills around finances, such as knowledge of QOF and the GP contract (28%), and on number of years of experience in the job (26%).
A total of 13% of respondents admitted they didn’t know how pay levels were set.
Unsurprisingly, pay is linked to practice managers’ commitment to staying in the job.
Despite 65% of respondents saying they are either very or fairly satisfied in their job, nearly two fifths admit they are thinking of leaving their job within the next 12 months.
And around three quarters of that cohort indicated that pay not keeping apace with the cost of living/inflation or that it doesn’t reflect the level of their work responsibilities/workload was in their top five reasons for considering quitting.
The survey results highlighted the range of benefits practice managers are offered as part of their employment package. The top three are membership of the NHS pension (78%), enhanced annual leave (62%), and free parking at work (60%).
Meanwhile, findings also showed that practice managers are responsible for a long list of duties that run to more than 20 areas and include: maximising finances and funding streams; purchasing and procurement; managing both non-clinical and clinical teams; HR; business planning; preparing for CQC assessment; IT and data security and more.
In larger organisations, this range of functions would be split among a number of different people or teams, yet in primary care these specialised roles are often tasked to just one person, the practice manager, the survey reports. This demonstrates the pressures practice managers face.
What experience and responsibilities the highest earners have.
Management in Practice editor, Rima Evans said: ‘Overwhelmingly, the survey results, together with comments from respondents, present evidence of a profession that derives great satisfaction from the work it does and takes pride in doing it well. Nevertheless, many practice managers are being pushed to their limit, with a significant proportion wanting to leave.
‘This is very worrying. If a demotivated practice manager workforce continues to be overlooked, primary care will lose the very people keeping it running smoothly and efficiently, which could threaten its future.’
Management in Practice is tailored to practice managers, GPs and healthcare professionals working in primary care, and carries essential news updates, blogs and business information for GP surgeries.
About the survey:
An online survey was carried out among Management in Practice readers based in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland between 13 June and 16 July 2023, and had 975 respondents. Only non-partner practice managers based in permanent roles (part-time or full-time) were allowed to participate.
Both respiratory and cardiology are clinical areas that benefit and thrive from the work of multidisciplinary teams; therefore, the audience will comprise key opinion leaders across all relevant professions.
We aim to provide high-quality clinical events to our audience where the speakers will represent Centres of Excellence across the UK and Europe. Healthcare professionals will have the opportunity to learn from colleagues in different hospitals and departments, ultimately improving clinical outcomes for patients.
The HHE Clinical Excellence content will highlight:
New advances in technologies such as diagnostic imaging
Clinical advances within targeted therapies and stroke care
Developments in new medications and techniques for treating patients
Benefits and challenges that our medical professionals are facing across the UK
The HHE Clinical Excellence Events enable the audience to gain knowledge from leading clinical professionals, ask questions and provide evaluation of the content. Each event follows the successful launch of the Cardiology and Respiratory Zones on Hospital Healthcare Europe, which respectively focus on these ever-important areas of clinical development.
Each event will comprise a full day of CPD-accredited content, with the possibility of sponsorship workshops, allowing the audience to discover new technologies, medications and opportunities.
This issue of Nursing in Practice, A manifesto for general practice nursing in 2024, spoke to general practice nurses to identify their top 10 points for action for 2024 – producing an exclusive manifesto for general practice nursing.
In our final issue of Nursing in Practice, we hear from many GPNs who aren’t happy with the direction of travel at their practices or the progress of the profession and want to see urgent change so that they can care for patients more effectively, so we asked 10 nurses for their top priorities to create a manifesto for general practice nursing.
GPNs highlighted issues such as workforce shortages, soaring patient demand, and pay and conditions that fall far short of those on offer to nurses working elsewhere in the NHS as just some of the ongoing issues hampering their nursing practice. Nurses identified health inequalities, focus on supporting patients with long-term conditions, health promotion and targeting immunisation update in general practice, as important areas requiring attention.
The 10 points of the manifesto for general practice nursing will also be published online at nursinginpractice.com and these important topics will form part of our ongoing content this year.
Our interview with Royal College of Nursing’s primary care lead shows just how important this year will be for nurses working in general practice. Indeed, 2024 will be pivotal for those in the sector, suggests Heather Randall, saying that the next 12 months could be ‘the making or demise’ of general practice nursing.
Elsewhere in this edition of Nursing in Practice, we review key priorities for nurses and the wider team in respiratory care, and in cardiovascular care – highlighting areas such as medication review, communication between primary and secondary care, patient education and the importance of patient follow-up.
An insightful article from an independent advanced nurse practitioner looks at the journey to advanced practice for nurses wanting to achieve it, the potential for regulation for this area of practice, and the value of the role in healthcare.
In this edition, Nursing in Practice has thanked readers for reading our print magazines over more than 20 years. We have now transitioned to a fully digital format, with articles updated daily, providing nurses with news, features, opinions, clinical advice and CPD, online, in newsletters and via the app.
