Shared Care

Posted on January 22nd, 2025

Private consultants may ask GPs to enter into shared care arrangements for the prescription of certain drugs.  As with any shared care agreement, a GP prescriber has no contractual obligation to accept an arrangement that they feel uncomfortable with.  Shared care by definition requires ongoing input from secondary care when needed and we would advise prescribers that this may well not be guaranteed when a patient has seen a consultant privately.   We would advise discussion of this with patients if you are aware that they are seeking a private opinion that might involve such a request as an outcome.

A private patient has a right to transfer into NHS care at any time. If they do transfer, they are entitled to that which is available locally to any other NHS patient with the same condition – no more, no less – and they should join the relevant NHS service at the same point as if their last episode of private care was delivered in the NHS, facing the same wait times as other NHS patients with the same clinical predicament at that point in the care pathway. In these circumstances, the private specialist should complete a consultant-to- consultant referral into the equivalent NHS clinic (which may be their own NHS clinic) – they should not ask the GP to do the referral for them.