ArticleThe British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners2014
Access to general practice and visits to accident and emergency departments in England: cross-sectional analysis of a national patient survey.
Article in The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 38 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
38 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Impact of integrating pharmacists into primary care teams on health systems indicators: a systematic review.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2019Pooled it
- Factors Influencing Non-urgent Emergency Department Visits: A Review of the Causes and Impact.Cureus · 2026Review
- Factors associated with avoidable non-urgent emergency department visits in South Tyrol (Italy): a multicentre cross-sectional study.BMC emergency medicine · 2026Article
- Did a national extended access scheme translate to improvements in patient experience to GP services in England? A retrospective observational study using patient-level data from the English GP patient survey.BMC health services research · 2025Observational
- Does Calm Always Follow the Storm? A Comprehensive Temporal Analysis of Emergency Department Visits in Northern Italy Before and After the COVID-19 Pandemic.Epidemiologia (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Comparing the clinical practice and prescribing safety of locum and permanent doctors: observational study of primary care consultations in England.BMC medicine · 2024Observational
- The performance of general practice in the English National Health Service (NHS): an analysis using Starfield's framework for primary care.Health affairs scholar · 2024Article
- Who, When, Why?-Traumatological Patients in the Emergency Department of a Maximum Care Provider.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Comparison of two GP service provider models in older adults: a register-based follow-up study.BJGP open · 2023Article
- Perspectives of GPs working in or alongside emergency departments in England: qualitative findings from the GPs and Emergency Departments Study.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2022Article
- Searching for the Optimal Method of Financing Hospital Emergency Departments-Comparison of Polish and Selected European Solutions.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- How sensitive are avoidable emergency department attendances to primary care quality? Retrospective observational study.BMJ quality & safety · 2021Observational
- Factors influencing streaming to General Practitioners in emergency departments: A qualitative study.International journal of nursing studies · 2021Article
- Are more GPs associated with a reduction in emergency hospital admissions? A quantitative study on GP referral in England.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2021Article
- Article
- Cancer diagnoses after emergency GP referral or A&E attendance in England: determinants and time trends in Routes to Diagnosis data, 2006-2015.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2019Article
- Exploring the characteristics, acuity and management of adult ED patients at night-time.Emergency medicine journal : EMJ · 2019Article
- Strengths and weaknesses of the acute care systems in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands: what can we learn from each other?BMC emergency medicine · 2019Article
- Deciding whether to consult the GP or an emergency department: A qualitative study of patient reasoning in Switzerland.The European journal of general practice · 2019Article
- Are inequalities in cancer diagnosis through emergency presentation narrowing, widening or remaining unchanged? Longitudinal analysis of English population-based data 2006-2013.Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2019Review
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5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundThe annual number of unplanned attendances at accident and emergency (A&E) departments in England increased by 11% (2.2 million attendances) between 2008-2009 and 2012-2013. A national review of urgent and emergency care has emphasised the role of access to primary care services in preventing A&E attendances.
aimTo estimate the number of A&E attendances in England in 2012-2013 that were preceded by the attending patient being unable to obtain an appointment or a convenient appointment at their general practice. DESIGN AND
settingCross-sectional analysis of a national survey of adults registered with a GP in England.
methodThe number of general practice consultations in England in 2012-2013 was estimated by extrapolating the linear trend of published data for 2000-2001 to 2008-2009. This parameter was multiplied by the ratio of attempts to obtain a general practice appointment that resulted in an A&E attendance to attempts that resulted in a general practice consultation estimated using the GP Patient Survey 2012-2013. A sensitivity analysis varied the number of consultations by ±12% and the ratio by ±25%.
resultsAn estimated 5.77 million (99.9% confidence interval = 5.49 to 6.05 million) A&E attendances were preceded by the attending patient being unable to obtain a general practice appointment or a convenient appointment, comprising 26.5% of unplanned A&E attendances in England in 2012-2013. The sensitivity analysis produced values between 17.5% and 37.2% of unplanned A&E attendances.
conclusionA large number of A&E attendances are likely to be preceded by unsuccessful attempts to obtain convenient general practice appointments in England each year.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.