Commissioning for Care Homes: A Low Priority for PCTs?

EMBARGOED UNTIL 00.01 HOURS WEDNESDAY 2 DECEMBER 2009 Commissioning for Care Homes: A Low Priority for PCTs? Research published today in Clinical Medicine, the Journal of the Royal College of Physicians, highlights that care home residents are missing out on access to vital specialist care as hospital doctors are stretched too thinly and Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) fail to commission additional services. Two national surveys of PCTs and doctors who specialise in the care of older people found that only 16% of geriatric medicine departments across England allocated time for care home work,