GPs back call for independent review of “dreadful” NHS 111

GPs' leaders have urged the government to commission an independent inquiry into the rollout of the NHS 111 urgent care telephone helpline in England. NHS England recently announced that it was to carry out its own review of the management and implementation of the new non-emergency service, 1 which has been beset with problems since its launch last month, including slow response times to calls and patients being sent inappropriately to hospital accident and emergency departments. The debate on 111 came after Laurence Buckman, chairman of the General Practitioners Committee, criticised the government's handling of the rollout of the 111 service during his keynote speech to the conference. 2 Buckman told GPs, "Two years ago we told the current government that the idea of NHS 111 in England was all right but that they could not keep people out of hospital by doing it on the cheap with a call handler to nurse ratio of 10 to one.