Patient's choice: GP or A&E department?
In the fourth and final part of his series, Mike Walsh explores the reasons for patients choosing to attend A&E departments rather than their own general practice. Factors influencing this are complex, and include perceived need for specialised treatment, mistrust of the GP or not being included on a GP list at all, but the author warns nurses to guard against viewing 'inappropriate' attenders as malingerers; patient and staff definitions of what constitutes 'appropriate' can be very different. The series closes with the author suggesting that increased responsibilities placed upon GPs by the Government's reforms require health service managers to urgently review why a significant proportion of attenders did not have any kind of GP cover.
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D002755:Choice Behavior; D003663:Decision Trees; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004739:England; D005194:Family Practice; D006300:Health Services Misuse / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D012189:Retrospective Studies